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Patrick Winterton |
TEAM PROFILE
Patrick Winterton
Patrick Winterton is one of our resident commentators on the Skiing on 4 show, providing you with coverage on Snowboard, women´s Alpine, Nordics alongside Mike Dixon and Freestyle skiing with Nick Fellows.
We caught up with Patrick and asked him how he first got into skiing.
"I first started skiing when I was five years old and living in Germany, but it was only when I moved to Norway at the age of ten that I discovered my love for this sport.
"Until then I had only considered Downhill, but from the age of ten onwards I moved towards Cross Country without ever looking back.
"However I did not compete until the age of 21, when I joined the Royal Marines, and decided to dedicate my self to Cross Country and Biathlon full time.
"In 1984, aged 23 I joined the British Cross Country team, and then made it to the World Championships in 1987, and became Team Captain the following year at the 1988 Calgary Olympics. This experience led me to become player manager for the British team."
Patrick retired from competitive skiing after the 1989 championships and returned to a student life in Manchester. He then tried Tele—mark skiing for a couple of seasons, before focusing entirely on broadcasting.
His commentating career started at BskyB and Eurosport in 1990, in an attempt to fund his increasingly expensive student life, and on discovering that it was more lucrative than lecturing at University, he decided never to let go of this chance.
Patrick has worked for Eurosport ever since, nowadays combining his ability for physiotherapy and his love for commentating. In fact he now works seasonally covering winter sports and runs his own physiotherapy practice during the summer months.
This is now Patrick´s second season commentating on ´Skiing on 4‘.
By Daniel Angiolini
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