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Team GB will endeavour to secure their best ever Winter Olympics medal haul at next month’s Games in Italy – but chef du mission Eve Muirhead insists success in Milan-Cortina will not only be measured by podium places.
Britain returned from the 2018 event in Pyeongchang and the 2014 staging in Sochi four years before that with five medals. In Beijing last time, they won just two.
And while it will be a young team who travel this time, 2022 curling gold medallist Muirhead is optimistic that some can return with ribbons around their neck.
“We’ve got a young team, packed with potential, and they’ve got nine world medals among them from this season, which is the most we’ve ever had going into a Games,” she told BBC Sport.
“You can’t put a price on a medal, which I know better than anyone. But everyone has their own targets. That could be a top 10, top eight, it could be to win a medal.
“We have got the opportunity to get the most we ever have, but I’m not going to put a number on it.”
Winter Olympics
Milano Cortina, Italy
4 February – 22 February 2026
As chef du mission, Muirhead will lead the team and take responsibility for logistics and athlete welfare, while being the link between athletes, coaches and the organising committee.
The 35-year-old’s intention is to see all of the Team GB athletes across the 16 sports, with 25 different venues in four separate clusters in the north of Italy.
And the Scot can use her recent experience to understand what the athletes both need and are feeling as the event edges closer. But does she feel envious?
“Do you know what, probably,” she conceded. “Whenever I watch major competitions, it makes me miss it. When I get there, there’s going to be a part of me that does miss it.
“But I am really, really excited and very privileged to be given the role that I have in helping deliver those athletes’ dreams at the Games.”
