'Devastated' GB miss out on bobsleigh medal

Team GB capped off a disappointing bobsleigh campaign at the Winter Olympics with a "devastating" seventh-place finish in the four-man bob event.

The team, piloted by Brad Hall, were targeting a medal at Milan-Cortina but gave themselves a difficult task, having sat seventh in the standings after day one of competition.

A podium finish would have required two spectacular runs as well as mistakes from some of the front-runners and, while heat three's time of 54.66 seconds was good, it was ultimately not enough.

Tied with Switzerland in sixth place going into the final run, Hall could not find the pace he needed to edge ahead of them and a run of 55.03secs gave them an overall time of 3:39.12 - 0.48secs off the bronze medal position.

"It's very difficult to put into words to be honest," Hall told BBC Sport.

"It's pretty devastating to finish where we did but we weren't in the place we wanted to be overnight and we said we were going to come out fighting and do the best we can - and that's what we feel like we did."

Germany were close to earning a clean sweep on the podium - their second of the week after doing so in the two-man event - but Switzerland swept in to take a surprise bronze.

However, Johannes Lochner piloted Germany to gold to complete the two and four-man double while his legendary compatriot Francesco Friedrich's team claimed silver.

It has been a tough Games for GB's bobsledders, who struggled in the two-man event and finished 12th overall.

Brakeman Taylor Lawrence sat out heats three and four as a precaution having suffered with a calf injury all season, and Hall said their full focus would be on the four-man event.

The four years since the Beijing Games have yielded success and that put an Olympic medal firmly on the radar but seventh place is a setback for Hall, who finished sixth in 2022.

However, the team have not enjoyed their best season in the build-up to the Games, winning just one World Cup medal and plagued by injuries and a lack of positive momentum.

"That's the way it happens sometimes. You're building momentum for the whole four years and then all of a sudden, it starts to go the other way and it's not that we've mistimed it, we've just been unfortunate," said Hall.

The 35-year-old is the most successful British men's pilot in World Cup history with 30 race medals and, after heat two, he said that he did not know where things had gone wrong.

A promising heat one left them in bronze medal position, but Hall was emotional after they bled time in the second and left themselves with too much to do on Sunday's final day of competition.

Their times in heat three and four were the sixth and 10th quickest respectively, and a shake of the head from Hall after run three illustrated his disgruntlement at how these Games have gone.

An Olympic medal is the only one missing from Hall's illustrious collection - he guided his team to a first world championship medal since 1939 when they took silver in 2023 after a maiden European title in Altenberg earlier that year.

"It didn't work out the way we wanted it to but we have so much to be proud of over the past four years - it just sucks to end a four-year Olympic period with a result like this," he said.