Australia is sending one of its strongest ever winter Olympic teams to Vancouver. We are a country with just six winter Olympic medals to our name and in 2010 we have a chance to double that tally in this one Games. Here are the athletes Twenty Ten thinks could bring home some Olympic bling.

Chumpy in charge

Snowboarding

Snowboard Cross

Alex "Chumpy" Pullin
The 24 year old is the new generation of Snowboard cross racers in Australia. Following in the footsteps of fellow team member and veteran Damon Hayler, Chumpy has gone from strength to strength with three top 10 finishes this season and is now placed eighth in the world.
Chumpy's last podium at World Cup level was in Feb 2008 in Japan, showing he has struggled to convert his solid improvements into solid finishes. Both Boardercross races will need to take advantage of the extraordinary circumstances at the Games to get on the podium, but because Boardercross is a sport with a huge chance factor, a race where anything can happen, we can say Chumpy is a medium to good chance to podium at Vancouver.

Damon Hayler
The 34 year old will be vying to better his seventh place finish at the last Olympic Games and his biggest asset will be his experience. Although Hayler has had a below average tour leading up to the Games, don't rule him out in the podium as his training has been prepped to peak right now at Vancouver.

Riders to watch for in Vancouver:
Men: Nate Holland, Seth Westcott
Women: Australia's only female competitor, Stephanie Hickey just scraped in to the team on a count back of nation spots and isn't a real medal contender, but will represent hard with her great fighting Aussie spirit. Lindsey Jacobellis is the name to watch for on the podium.

Half pipe

Torah Bright
With four Australians and five Kiwi snowboarders attending the halfpipe event there is one snowboarder that stands way above all the others as the most obvious chance for an Olympic Medal and that is Torah Bright.
A fifth in Torino Olympics in 2006, could be partially blamed on the weight of huge national expectations. A snowboarding athlete such as Bright, although she is used to lots of general media attention, rarely has the pressure of the intense sport media attention that is placed on our national heros like cricketers and footballers. The weight of this attention in Italy, certainly effected Bright's performance (along with a shoulder injury) and the result was fifth and far from the podium.
But four years down the tack, the experience of Olympic pressure and two new World Titles, Bright shows she's got the strength of character to rise above. Her skill and talent is not in question however uncertainty about her podium possibility, in the form of the athletes' archenemy - injury, has arisen in recent weeks. Another shoulder injury kept her away from competing half of last year and even though her comeback at the Saas Fee World Cup in November saw her win Gold, she missed the opportunity to really cement her favourite status by missing the X Games in Aspen last week.
The X-Games has long been seen as the event to win, and last year Bright did win. The expectation was she would unleash her newest trick the "double-cork". This is a double flipping, spinning trick made famous this year by none other than Shaun White and never yet attempted by a female snowboarder in competition. The world waited with baited breath for Bright to take girls riding to a new level, however in a dramatic turn of events she concussed herself performing a simple manoeuvre and retired. American Gretchen Bleiler went on to win the event with a run that will be more than hard for Bright to beat.
Apparently now recovered and ready for the Olympics, Bright has to overcome the injuries that have held her back from important contest experience this season and successfully block out the huge expectations and pressure of a national media that all but expect to see our golden girl on the podium. Can she overcome the questions?

Holly Crawford
Holly Crawford represents Australia's dark horse, or secret weapon. She could easily make the podium at the 2010 Olympics and everyone will ask, "where did she come from?" And the answer is she has been here the whole time, under the huge shadow of Ms Bright.
Living under Bright's shadow, must be frustrating sometimes, but for this Olympics, it could be the key to Crawford's success. In the last three months Crawford has repeatedly landed on the podium at some of the biggest events in the USA. Her huge amplitude and aggressive riding style turned more than a few heads, who didn't want to turn from fear of loosing focus on themselves and their own country.
Crawford may not be as technical as her teammate, but don't be surprised if you find her on the back page of every paper in Australia standing on the podium in Vancouver as the first Australian snowboarder with a medal around her neck.

Snowboarding supernova Shaun White seems unstoppable in half pipe

Who to Watch for in Vancouver.
Men: Shaun White
Women: Torah Bright, Holly Crawford, Kelly Clarke, Gretchen Blieler

Freestyle Skiing

Moguls

Dale Begg-Smith
If any Aussie can be said to be a sure bet it's Dale Begg-Smith. The 24 year old is the reigning Olympic gold medal holder and a strong 2009/10 season has earned him the World Number One spot, despite recovering from a February 2009 knee reconstruction. To date no one has been able to win a back to back gold medal in mogul skiing and Begg-Smith looks ready to make history.
Challenges will come from several of the Canadians, including Alexandre Bilodeau and possibly from some of the French, but Begg-Smith has a proven stratergy that seems to be working well; he combines his signature tricks, performed flawlessly, with unmatchable speed to generate high style and speed points.

Begg-Smith contemplating victory

Ironically Begg-Smith will be competing on his former home turf. He began his career based in Vancouver with the Canadian Freestyle Team as a junior but abandoned the Canadian's due to a disagreement over training priorities at the time. Begg-Smith saw more opportunity and flexibility with the Australian program where they welcomed such young talent to bolster sagging results within men's mogul skiing. All of this is scripted like a Hollywood blockbuster and out of every Olympics comes a story. Gold for Dale at Vancouver will be the story.

Who to watch out for in Vancouver
men: Alexandre Bilodeau and Guilbaut Colas are probably the favourites to upset Begg-Smith if anyone can
women: Australia has one female mogul skier, 15 year old Britteny Cox. She is not expected to make the podium but has a good chance of making it to the top 16 final round. Jennifer Heil of Canada has been the season's strongest performer, with the United States team also a threat.

Aerials

Jacqui Cooper
Jacqui Cooper is the world's most decorated aerialist, the only prize that has alluded her thus far is an Olympic medal. The record breaking five time World Cup overall champion has won 24 World Cup victories, has been World Champion three times and until recently held the world record for the highest awarded score in World Cup competition.
The Olympics however remains her nemesis, Injury and misfortune have conspired to thwart her hopes of a medal at each of the four previous Olympics she has attended. Having been unable to qualify for finals in a World Cup this season may or may not be indicative of what to expect come Vancouver as Cooper has yet to perform the big jumps she'll be doing for the Games. Hopefully she has been using the World Cup events as mere practice and will peak when it matters most.

Lydia Lassila
Based on World Cup performance this season, Lydia Lassila is Australia's best hope for gold. She was the 2009 World Number One and has been the only competitor in the 2009/10 season to knock the Chinese off the podium - winning back to back victories in Deer Valley and Lake Placid. In the process she broke team mate Cooper's world record for the highest awarded score in World Cup.
Lassila is fit and feeling in fine form heading into the Games, which is perhaps the most important factor.

Ones to watch in Vancouver
women: Cooper and Lassila are supported by Bree Munro and Liz Gardner, who have both demonstrated solid form this year. If things go their way, Australia's girls could be the dominant force at the Games. The Chinese team however will do it's best to rain on their parade and their determination should not be discredited.
Men: Australia's David Morris has developed phenomenally through this season and is bringing a new level of difficulty to his jump for Vancouver, he could be a serious competitor. Anton Kushnir from Belorussia has dominated the World Cup scene this year, tailed closely by the Chinese.

Short Track Skating

Tatiana Borodulina
Australia claimed its first ever winter Olympic medal in short track when the men's 5000m relay team skated to bronze at the 1994 Olympics, Steve Bradbruy's stunning 2002 gold medal snatch in the men's 1000m cemented Australia's short track skating tradition and now Tatiana Borodulina is set to take that tradition to the next level.

Tatiana Borodulina in the Australian colours

Borodulina, who immigrated to Australia from Russia in 2006, after competing for her birth country at the Torino Olympics, will skate in each of the three female distances in Vancouver. She has multiple World Cup medals to her name including back to back gold in the 500m at World Cups in the 2008/09 season. She is a multiple European champion and was ranked third in the world overall for 500m at the end of the 2008/09 season.
World Cup short track competition finished in November 2009, Borodulina was ranked 15th in the World overall coming out of the last World Cup round, however she has been training steadily in Calgary for the past few months and by all accounts is a focused and serious athlete and has the means and the motivation to pull out a medal finish in any one of the three distances in Vancouver.

Who to watch for gold in Vancouver:
women: The very competitive Chinese contingent, headed by Meng Wang and Yang Zhou, along with and Katherine Reutter of the USA
Men: Australia will be represented in the 1000m by Lachlan Hay. Jung-Su Lee of Korea and Charles Hamelin of Canada are the men to watch for at the front of the pack.

Skeleton

Melissa Hoar
If Melissa Hoar continues on the trajectory she has been riding through the 2009/10 season she will be atop the Olympic podium next week. The 27 year old has made a stunning return from nearly two years of persistent injury with a slew of Intercontinental Cup wins and a current World Ranking of 10th.
Hoar began her climb in October and November 2009, winning several Intercontinental Cups, she was not expected to return to World Cup form this season, nor qualify as one of Australia's two Olympic female skeleton athletes, however stunning results at Intercontinental Cup level pushed her up to World Cup competition, where she has slid to top ten finishes in every race. From being ranked Australia's third skeleton slider, she became number one and joins teammate Emma Lincoln-Smith in Vancouver.
Hoar's skeleton prowess was exhibited early; in 2006 she astounded the sliding world by winning the World Junior (under 23) Championships, off the back of a season that saw her win a Challenge Cup and earn respectable placements in her first World Cup competitions. Her incredible return to form and exhibited talent in the sliding track make Hoar a serious Olympic contender.

Who to watch for gold in Vancouver
Ladies: Melissa Hollingsworth of Canada is skeleton's undisputed queen. Nipping at her heels are the German contingent including Kerstin Szymkowiak and Marion Trott.
Men: Australia will be represented by Anthony Deane, a relative newcomer to the sport who took his first slide exactly one year ago. The names to look out for are Latvian Martins Dukurs and the Germans Frank Rommel and Sandro Stielicke.

The best of the rest

Ski cross racer Jenny Owens and alpine skier Jono Brauer should by rights be in this list. Owens, who represented Australia in alpine skiing before switching to the ski cross, which makes its Olympic debut in Vancouver, has performed spectacularly in the ski cross World Cup in previous seasons and holds several World Cup medals. Unfortunately injury this season has marred her Olympic preparation and will most likely reduce her performance expectations at the Games.
Brauer is also suffering from lingering injury. The downhill, super G and super combined racer is struggling to return from a knee reconstruction in March 2009 and has not been able to race in any World Cup events this season. The 28 year old could have been expected to perform strongly in the super combined, but now admits he will be racing in pain at the Games.

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