Matt Weston kicked off the 2026 skeleton season in spectacular fashion by winning the men’s skeleton race in St Moritz on Wednesday morning. The rescheduled event, initially set for Winterberg, Germany, was postponed due to adverse weather conditions and took place six days later in the iconic Swiss sliding venue.
At just 29 years old, Weston demonstrated impressive dominance, securing his fourth gold in five races and finishing over 1.25 seconds ahead of the 27-strong field across two runs. Italy’s Amedeo Bagnis, who took silver, was 1.29 seconds behind Weston, while Olympic Champion Christopher Grotheer claimed bronze, trailing by 1.5 seconds. The rest of the competitors were at least two seconds slower.
“It feels amazing to be back racing and pushing at 100 percent after the injury,” Weston said, reflecting on his performance after recovering from a serious quadriceps tear. “The race felt good. I know I’ve still got things I can clean up but I was pretty happy with the overall feeling. We’ve been working on some different stuff leading up to Cortina, so it was good to see that showing well. We’ll get ready to go again and I’m excited to see what we can do on Friday.”
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Weston’s season statistics are impressive — four gold medals and a silver, with just two World Cup races remaining in St Moritz and Altenberg before the Winter Olympics in Italy this February. Leading the World Cup standings by 150 points ahead of China’s Zheng Yin, Weston is firmly on course to claim a third consecutive Overall World Cup title.
Teammate Marcus Wyatt is also in strong form, currently sitting third in the rankings after placing seventh in St Moritz with a time of 2:17.95. Wyatt, who is the only other athlete to have won a World Cup race this season, faces stiff competition from South Korea’s Seunggi Jun and Germany’s Axel Jungk, who are just three and seventeen points behind him respectively.
Jacob Salisbury finished 21st in St Moritz with a time of 2:19.59 and holds the same position in the World Cup standings.
In the 4-man bobsleigh, the British team, including Brad Hall, Leon Greenwood, Taylor Lawrence, and Greg Cackett, narrowly missed out on their first World Cup medal by 0.19 seconds but delivered their best result this season by finishing fifth. This performance cements their fifth-place ranking in the 4-man World Cup with two races left before the Olympics.
The British sled had strong starts, being the fifth fastest in Run 1 and seventh in Run 2. Taylor Lawrence, a 2022 Olympian and serving Royal Marine, made his season debut after recovering from a calf injury that kept him out of earlier events. At the halfway mark, they held the bronze position, just fractions of a second behind race leaders from Germany.
Despite a strong second run by Germany’s Adam Ammour pushing the British team down a spot, Brad Hall and his teammates finished with a combined time of 1:49.32. Race winner Francesco Friedrich completed the course in 1:49.07 on a milestone 100th 4-man World Cup race start.
Austria’s Markus Treichl finished fifth, Swiss pilot Cedric Follador sixth, and Italy’s Patrick Baumgartner, who leads Hall in overall standings, was seventh.
Earlier in the day, British athletes Adele Nicoll and Ashleigh Nelson competed in the women’s bobsleigh event at St Moritz, finishing 18th overall. The duo recorded a combined two-run time of 1:55.71 after improving from 20th to 15th between runs. Laura Nolte of Germany took gold, with teammates Lisa Buckwitz and Kim Kalicki completing the podium sweep.
The World Cup circuit will continue with its penultimate race in St Moritz, setting the stage for the final competitions ahead of the Winter Olympics.