Day 4 Success for Jack Gower and The Cross Country Quartet in Liberec

The cross country quartet of Katy Homyer, Calum Irvine, Michael May and Ruaridh Newman all rounded off their European Youth Olympic Winter Festival in style, each achieving new personal bests in girls and boys freestyle technique races.

Homyer in her preferred event, the 5km freestyle technique, had a fantastic first lap gaining ten seconds on the Slovakian competitor in front her. Homyer finished strongly recording a time of 13:53.6 seconds and placed 59th. She was awarded 256.37 FIS points for the race, a new personal best and her time was just shy of the British record.

Homyer said; "I'm pleased with that but I really wanted a top 50 finish.

"This course was very very tough. It's not just your lungs that hurt but also your legs as well. Really your whole body is just in pain because on the first section of the course there's a really big hill coming out of the start which is exhausting, especially on the second time around.

"This whole festival has been such a good experience. Just seeing the top girls doing the sprints is really interesting - I want to be like them, I want to be as fast as them. This event just helps to motivate you even more and I'm really hoping to be able to compete in such big events in the future."

Calum Irvine joined Huntly cross country duo Michael May, and Ruaridh Newman for the boys 7.5km freestyle technique. Irvine recorded a time of 18.03.4 seconds placing him 60th which earnt him 198.29 FIS points and his second personal best of the festival. May and Newman finished 80th and 83rd respectively, which were also personal bests.

Irvine said; "Today was better than I expected. I got into the start gate with quite tired legs but it picked up as I started racing so I'm pleased with that.

"It's a great feeling to have finished all my racing. Training starts as soon as I get home to try and qualify for the Youth Winter Olympics next year in Innsbruck which will be a lot of hard work but I think that should be achievable. It's been really great experience racing against so many people from other countries. I was a bit nervous when I got here but this has been a huge event for me and it's helped highlight my weaknesses so I'll go back home and really work on them and then hopefully come back stronger.

"To achieve another personal best here in Liberec is also a fantastic achievement, I will take home many fond memories of the EYOWF."

Team GB's boys alpine team of Jack Gower, Nick Moynihan, Paul Henderson and Sam Clissold returned to the Ještěd resort for the boys slalom hoping to improve their performances following Tuesday's giant slalom. Unfortunately Gower was the only member of the team to complete the first run after Moynihan, Henderson and Clissold missed a gate in the first half of the course.

Reflecting after the first run Moynihan said; "I was up at the top ready to go and I was hoping to do a good run as I was in the right frame of mind but I just didn't get into it at the start.

"But I have come away from it now and to be honest I am here with Team GB, in this huge competition, so I am pretty happy about everything really.

"I just hope I can bring the good things forward from this all into my next race and take the positives forward off the back of this trip to Liberec."

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After the first run Gower placed 20th and was confident going into his second run. Gower skied clean and placed 17th recording the highest place finish out of the Team GB alpine team in Liberec.

"I am pleased with how the slalom has gone, especially after the disappointment of the giant slalom which I was hoping to do really well in," said Gower.

"It was a tricky event for me as slalom is not my strong point. It was hard out there in the slalom but I am really happy that I finished the slalom as it is the first slalom race of the year for me, so to get a good result is great.

"It was a solid run, nothing spectacular but I am walking away happy. Hopefully there is more to come in the year ahead."