Charlotte Bankes, Katie Ormerod and Dave Ryding are among the leading contenders for Team GB

Team GB have a squad of 50 athletes in Beijing and have been set a medal target of three to seven by UK Sport. 

Here are five contenders to watch:

Charlotte Bankes – snowboard cross

The 26-year-old is Britain’s leading hope for gold. She competed for France at the past two Games but switched back to the country of her birth in 2018. 

She is the reigning world champion and has dominated the current World Cup season.

Bruce Mouat – Men’s curling and mixed curling

Mouat, 27, is a strong medal hope in both disciplines. As skip of the men’s rink of Hammy McMillan, Bobby Lammie and Grant Hardie, they took silver in the world championships in 2021. 

Alongside Jen Dodds, he is the reigning world champion in the mixed.

Bruce Mouat is another one to watch from Team GB after winning silver at the 2021 Championships

Dave Ryding – Alpine Skiing

Aged 35, he became the first British skier in history to win a World Cup event in the famed Kitzbühel slalom earlier this month. 

The son of a market trader, he learnt his sport on a dry slope in Lancashire and will be contesting his fourth Winter Olympics.

Dave Ryding became the first British skier in history to win a World Cup event

Katie Ormerod – snowboard slopestyle and Big Air

After snapping her heel in two prior to Pyeongchang 2018, Ormerod, 24, was crowned Britain’s first snowboard World Cup winner in 2020. 

Is yet to make a podium this season.

Katie Ormerod was Britain’s first snowboard World Cup champion in 2020

Brad Hall – four-man and two-man bobsleigh

With minimal funding, Hall and his team (Greg Cackett, Taylor Lawrence and Nick Gleeson in the four, and with Gleeson in the two) were initially the butt of jokes on the circuit. 

But after collecting six World Cup medals and another at the test event on the Beijing track, they are genuine medal contenders.

Brad Hall and the rest of the GB bobsleigh team are genuine medal contenders in Beijing

Five international stars:

Mikaela Shiffrin, USA

There was a time when she was billed as the next Lindsey Vonn, but with skiing gold medals in the past two Games she has gone past her predecessor. 

The 26-year-old will again be the star attraction of the Winter Olympics

USA’s Mikaela Shiffrin will be the star attraction in the skiing events at the Winter Olympics

Eileen Gu, China

The 18-year-old, a two-time world champion in freestyle skiing, will be the face of the Games, but also one of the more contentious topics, owing to her decision to switch nationality from the US to China in 2019. 

Marco Odermatt, Switzerland

Billed as the next big thing in skiing, Odermatt, 24, won five golds at the junior world championships in 2018 and travels to Beijing as a major medal threat in each of the giant slalom, super-G and downhill.

Shaun White, USA

Aged 35, the snowboarder won Olympic gold in 2006, 2010 and 2018 and returns for one last Games after a three-year break from competing. 

One of the most famous Winter Olympians in history, he was the subject of sexual harassment allegations prior to Pyeongchang 2018.

Shaun White is returning for one last Olympic Games after a three-year break from action

Jamaican bobsleigh team

After a 24-year absence from the Winter Games, Jamaica’s four-man bobsleigh team have qualified for the first time since the 1988 quartet immortalised by the Cool Runnings film.