Uhlaender — a five-time Olympian — wanted CAS, the court said, to determine if Canada’s skeleton coach manipulated a race result by pulling four racers out of a North American Cup event in Lake Placid, New York, on Jan. 11. Canada’s move made fewer rankings points available in that race, and Uhlaender fell short of qualifying for the Olympics.

The International Bobsled and Skeleton Federation had already decided that no rules were broken, and the International Olympic Committee deferred to that decision. So, Uhlaender took her case to CAS and got a hearing on Sunday.

A day later, CAS said its division set up for the Milan Cortina Games can only resolve disputes that happen within 10 days of the start of those Olympics — meaning Jan. 27 or later. The race in question happened Jan. 11 and the IBSF’s appeal tribunal rendered its decision on Jan. 23.

“Consequently, the application fell outside the jurisdiction,” CAS wrote.

Kelly Curtis and Mystique Ro will represent the U.S. in the women’s skeleton event at the Olympics.

CAS also has decided that an appeal filed by Ireland’s luge team against the International Luge Federation cannot go forward for the same reason — that it doesn’t fall into the 10-day window around the games.

Ireland argued that Elsa Desmond — — was “unlawfully deprived … of a qualifying place for the 2026 OWG by failing to allocate a remaining qualification place and unlawfully allocating qualification places to athletes granted Individual Neutral Athlete (AIN) status.” It also said the two sliders from Russia who were given those AIN designations did not meet all qualifications for an Olympic spot.

The IOC granted 106 spots for luge athletes at these games, across all disciplines. All 106 spots are taken, but only by 105 athletes. Austrian slider Wolfgang Kindl qualified in both men’s singles and men’s doubles, and some athletes have argued for a 106th athlete.

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee last week asked for Uhlaender to get a spot, citing how her qualifying chances were hurt by Canada’s decision to pull four sliders from a race and limit the available number of rankings points earlier this month.

The International Bobsled and Skeleton Federation — the sport����ap governing body — investigated that race and said no rules were broken. USOPC chief of sport and athlete services Rocky Harris said the IOC deferred to that in its reply to the Americans.

“We got a response this morning that they are supporting the international federation’s decision on the matter,” Harris said.

Harris said he’ll meet with Uhlaender to “see how she wants to move forward.” Uhlaender has previously said she’s willing to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

USA Bobsled and Skeleton declined to comment.

The Americans are sending in women’s skeleton; both were on Monday.

“We were requesting an additional slot for the sport to allocate to Katie, so it would not have taken away from one of our currently competing athletes,” Harris said.

The 41-year-old Uhlaender — hoping to be the first woman to compete in the Winter Games six times for the U.S. — fell just short of qualifying for the Olympic team. If the North American Cup race in question had at least 21 sliders, which would have been the case before Canada’s decision to hold some racers out, she may have earned an Olympic berth.

Uhlaender won that race in Lake Placid, New York, which had 19 sliders. She received 25% fewer rankings points than she would have in a full field, and that difference left her behind Ro in the final standings.

Uhlaender did not qualify for the U.S. World Cup team entering this season, which made her Olympic quest even more challenging. She competed on the lower-tier NAC and Asian Cup circuits in an effort to collect enough points to qualify.

Canada has insisted it acted within the rules.

Uhlaender said last week that she was hoping the IOC would “send a powerful message to young athletes everywhere: that standing up for ethics and integrity may be difficult, but it matters.”

Then again, her resume suggests that she’s made it look easy. Uhlaender is a five-time Olympian, joining snowboarders Shaun White and Lindsey Jacobellis and curling’s John Shuster as the only members of this U.S. team in that club. She’s a past world champion, a past World Cup champion, and was the top-ranked American woman on the skeleton circuit this season.

Not bad for a 37-year-old, who just happens to be the oldest American female athlete competing in the Beijing Olympics.

“And it����ap still fun,” Uhlaender said.

It hasn’t always been fun. That is the hallmark of Uhlaender’s story, especially in Olympic years.

Her Olympic debut was in 2006, a season where her coach got fired just before the start of the Turin Games while others on the team were dealing with major injuries, a lawsuit, a harassment allegation and a positive doping test. In 2010, she was dealing with a shattered kneecap and grieving the loss of her father. In 2014, a concussion derailed some of her season and she narrowly missed — then had, then missed again — an Olympic medal. In 2018, she had to race with a broken heart, largely because of the death of close friend and U.S. bobsled great Steven Holcomb.

The challenge entering this year’s Olympics: She tested positive for COVID-19 last month, while the three-woman race for two berths was ridiculously close, and if her clearance to resume sliding had come even a day or two later than it did she would have had no chance of getting to Beijing.

“There’s only so much I can control, right? So now, I just want to have fun while I can,” Uhlaender said. “I mean, I didn’t really expect to be able to be competing like a metal contender at 37. But it����ap happening.”

Skeleton — the headfirst sliding discipline where athletes can reach 80 mph or so — at the Beijing Games starts Thursday with the men’s competition, where Andrew Blaser will make his Olympic debut and be the lone American in the field. Women’s skeleton, with Uhlaender and Olympic rookie Kelly Curtis sliding for the U.S., begins Friday.

They all took wild paths to skeleton. Blaser wanted to be a bobsledder at first, before being told his slim frame just wasn’t right for that sport and getting steered toward skeleton instead. Curtis, who serves in the U.S. Air Force, was a track athlete who also then went into bobsled before changing course. Uhlaender was a skier, has since dabbled with weightlifting and cycling, and hasn’t ruled out trying to pick up curling in the future.

“Katie has kind of taken a little bit of the Mother Goose role right now where she’s like, ‘No, no, that����ap not how, you’ll learn, OK,’” Blaser said. “She’s been trying to kind of teach us the ways around what happens at the Olympics.”

Nobody knows that path better than Uhlaender does.

She was sixth in the Turin Games in 2006, 11th four years later at Vancouver and placed 13th at Pyeongchang four years ago.

What����ap missing there is the 2014 Sochi Games: Uhlaender was fourth when she left Russia, then appeared to have been promoted to third place years later — for 70 days — then dropped back down to fourth again. Those were the Olympics held under the cloud of Russia’s state-sponsored doping scandal, and the host country’s Elena Nikitina is the bronze medalist from those Games even though she had been implicated in that mess.

Nikitina’s medal was taken away after a long investigation led to her disqualification from the Sochi Games; Uhlaender never actually received the medal, just the title of bronze medalist, and then lost that anyway when Nikitina’s third-place finish was restored under appeal.

Nikitina and Uhlaender are still competing head-to-head. Uhlaender has been furious with the system, not with her competitor.

“I wanted to come back and just prove to myself that I could focus on the purity of sport, the part of it that kind of blurs the lines or dissipates the need to take a stance with politics or religion or whatever,” Uhlaender said. “I mean, it����ap really awesome to look to my right and left and high-five the Russians and know that we’re competing purely for sport and at our best. We still hold our own opinions of the past, but we respect each other as competitors and we respect the passion of sport — for sport.”

Uhlaender intends these to be her final Olympics. With her, one never really knows. Retirement has been talked about, but now she’s thinking about continuing to race for at least one more season and potentially getting to compete in the world championships for the 10th time.

Her whole life has been being an athlete. She, only half-seriously, said her home address right now is the Olympic Village. When the Beijing Games end, she plans to return to the Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid, New York, and figure out what����ap next.

Maybe she’ll slide. Maybe she won’t. But if the next phase gets handled the way her sliding career did, she’ll be able to deal with whatever challenge comes her way.

“Try doing skeleton and then tell me it����ap not amazingly fun,” Uhlaender said. “It����ap the ultimate.”

Specialty: Skeleton

Age: 37

A staple at the Winter Olympics, Uhlanender is making her fifth appearance at the Games, having participated in every one since 2006. She finished sixth in Torino, 11th in Vancouver, fourth in Sochi (falling short of the podium by .04 seconds) and 13th in Pyeongchang. She is well decorated in the world championships, winning six medals (two golds, one silver and three bronzes). In 2012, she competed in the Olympic trials for weightlifting but didn’t make the team. Her father is former Major League outfielder Ted Uhlaender, who played for Minnesota, Cleveland and Cincinnati.

Competing: Feb. 7-9, 11-12

The Centennial State will have 23 athletes, by their recognized hometowns, according to the United State Olympic and Paralympic Committee. It is tied for the second biggest contingent with Minnesota and behind only California (29).

Alpine skier Mikaela Shiffrin, of Edwards, is the most decorated among the Colorado crew, having won two gold medals (slalom in 2014 and giant slalom in 2018) and a silver (combined in 2018). The two golds are tied for the most all-time among American Alpine racers.

Vail-born skeleton racer Katie Uhlaender will be competing in her fifth Olympic Games, tied for the most on the Americans with Lindsey Jacobelis, John Shuster and Shaun White.

Silverthorne’s Red Gerard returns for his second Olympic Games. In 2018, he became the youngest winter Olympian to win a gold medal at the age of 17, after capturing the slopestyle title in snowboarding. Goaltender Nicole Hensley, of Littleton, will again mind the net as the U.S. women’s hockey team looks to defend its gold. Aspen native Alex Ferriera won silver in the freestyle ski halfpipe in 2018. Alex Deibold won bronze in the snowboard cross in 2014.

Nordic combined racer Taylor Fletcher, of Steamboat Springs, is competing in his fourth straight Olympics, while Aaron Blunck, of Crested Butte, is going to his third. Other Coloradans returning for their second Games, include Taylor Gold (2014), Mick Dierdorff (2018), Alex Deibold (2014), Hagen Kearney (2018), Jasper Good (2018) and Joanne Reid (2018).

Here’s a look at the list of Colorado athletes, including ones not officially listed by the USOC:

Alpine skiing

• Nina O’Brien, Denver
• River Radamus, Edwards
• Mikaela Shiffrin, Edwards

Biathlon

• Joanne Reid, Grand Junction

Bobsled

• Sylvia Hoffman, Colorado Springs

Cross country skiing

• Hailey Swirbul, Aspen

Figure skating

• Mariah Bell, Monument
• Brandon Frazier, Colorado Springs

Freestyle skiing

• Aaron Blunck, Crested Butte
• Alex Ferreira, Aspen
• Hanna Faulhaber, Basalt
• Birk Irving, Winter Park
• Kai Owens, Vail
• Dylan Walczyk, Blue River

Hockey

• Nicole Hensley, Littleton
• Nick Shore, Denver

Nordic combined

• Taylor Fletcher, Steamboat Springs
• Jasper Good, Steamboat Springs

Skeleton

• Katie Uhlaender, Breckenridge

Snowboarding

• Chris Corning, Silverthorne
• Alex Deibold, Boulder
• Mick Dierdorff, Steamboat Springs
• Lucas Foster, Telluride

• Stacy Gaskill, Golden
• Red Gerard, Silverthorne
• Taylor Gold, Steamboat Springs
• Zoe Kalapos, Vail
• Hagen Kearney, Norwood
• Cody Winters, Steamboat Springs

The four-race series continues next Saturday and Sunday at Mount Van Hoevenberg. Uhlaender and Blaser are the front-runners to grab two of the four spots on the World Cup team that are available in the team trials.

Reigning women’s national champion Kendall Wesenberg and men’s national champion Austin Florian already have World Cup spots clinched. The U.S. will have three men and three women on the World Cup roster.

Uhlaender’s two-run time was 1 minute, 52.50 seconds — well ahead of second-place Savannah Graybill (1:53.06) and third-place Megan Henry (1:53.13). Uhlaender is a four-time Olympian who didn’t compete last season and now seems likely to return to the World Cup circuit in her comeback year.

“Katie wouldn’t be a four-time Olympian if she weren’t good at what she does,” USA Skeleton coach Tuffy Latour said. “She’s always in the mix.”

Blaser was dominant in the men’s race, winning by more than a full second. He finished two runs in 1:49.60, with Alex Ivanov second in 1:50.80 and Stephen Garbett third in 1:50.88.

“If you’d asked me three years ago where Andrew would be today, I probably wouldn’t have said on top of the podium,” Latour said. “This wasn’t his favorite track, but he’s grown to love it, and he walked away with the race today.”

With 30 seconds to her start, she looked up to get cues from her coaches. And there was her mom. She had not seen Karen Uhlaender, who had flown out from her home in Colorado, in more than four years. They had not spoken in four years. They’d had, Uhlaender said, “a bit of a falling out.”

“A burst of emotion hit me,” said the 33-year-old Colorado native and American skeleton sliding legend. “I saw nothing but love but it was a lot to take in at that moment.”

It wasn’t Uhlaender’s best Olympic showing. That would have been four years ago at the Sochi Olympics, when she finished fourth, a mere four-hundredths of second behind Russian bronze medalist Elena Nikitina. She finished the fourth heat on Saturday , Great Britain’s Lizzy Arnold. Germany’s Jacqueline Loelling won silver, followed by Great Britain’s Laura Deas for bronze, capping a very good Olympic day for England.

Uhlaender had tears in her eyes Friday night but they weren’t because of lost milliseconds. She might have skidded a bit coming out of turn seven in her last heat, but that wasn’t causing the upswell of emotion. There was her cheering section, a rowdy gallery of friends and family, including the mother of Steve Holcombe, a gold-medal bobsledder and Uhlaender’s best friend. She had at the Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid last May.

There were the memories from her near-death illness in late 2016. There were the surgeries — a dozen in 12 years to ankles, knees and hips and none, amazingly, from injuries sustained while sliding on her belly at highway speeds. There was her self-funded push to her fourth Olympics. The week has been a cascade of grief and gratefulness, love and sorrow.

“I was crying at the start house. I think I’ve been crying all week if we are going to honest. I just looked at my coaches and said like why do I have to be so human. Can you take the feels away please,” she said, her red-dyed hair spilling from a battered helmet perched high like a crown. “Because you can’t control grief and you can’t control your desires and your wants sometimes and I was just letting myself cry and letting myself feel it.”

Last fall, when Nikitina was implicated in a doping scandal and the International Olympic Committee stripped her bronze, it looked like Uhlaender would be awarded her first Olympic medal. But a few weeks ago the Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned Nikitina’s ban, along with 27 other Russian athletes and reinstated their Sochi results.

But Uhlaender isn’t bitter about that.

“Man that����ap the crazy thing. That����ap what I’ve been trying to accomplish over the last year just realizing that races don’t define you,” she said.

That wisdom comes from her deathbed. She had pretty much accepted death in November 2016 and was ready to surrender as an auto-immune disease ravaged her body.

“I just remember being at peace and thinking I’ve lived a great life. I wasn’t thinking I’m a three-time Olympian or I’ve done this or I’ve done that,” she said. “I was literally thinking of the people I’ve loved and the people who love me. The experiences I had standing on top of mountain about to rip a peak and it����ap totally quiet. I think about all the moments. It wasn’t the results, it was the moments going down the track when my stomach is my throat and I just loved life. Whether that bronze is mine or not, that����ap not what it����ap about. I think it����ap an opportunity to seize the moment and that����ap what I tried to do here. I think I want to walk away knowing that I have tons of people that have loved me; that have supported me and the journey is crazy.”

On Saturday, she still hadn’t talked to her mom. She isn’t even sure where her mom lives in Colorado. She blew her mom a kiss from the starting line on Friday night, but hadn’t seen her since. She said she is ready to forgive and felt confident that her mom, traveling so many thousands of miles to see her, was ready to do so too.

But she said she couldn’t imagine doing this again.

“To go another four years sounds crazy,” she said, noting how she has a lot of debt from “investing in this one moment,” including buying her own sled, speed suit and helmet while funding her own training and travel through her work with a neurology clinic helping teach people about concussions and brain awareness, a subject that she knows well. “I don’t know how to do it again for four years and be almost 40. I don’t know.”

She’s quick to dispel any notion of suffering though.

“I don’t call it sacrifice,” she said. “It����ap a privilege and a choice to represent my country and everyone that helped me get here.”

Ulhaender, a four-time Olympian, finished eighth in the first run and 13th in the second run. She trails the leader, Jacqueline Loelling of Germany, by cumulative time of 0.87 of a second.

“I think I have to take it in stride,” Uhlaender said in quotes distributed by USA Bobsled/Skeleton. “The groove threw me in the first run pretty hard, I skidded through one and it took me a few curves to get it back. The second run, I just was bouncing. The groove wasn’t cut wrong, it was just wide. So I think I just hesitated on my start and then maybe I over-drove. I don’t have an answer. I thought that second run was really solid.”

The other U.S. slider in women’s skeleton is Kendall Wesenburg, a Californian who is a graduate of the University of Colorado-Boulder. She stands 17th at the midway point, 1.87 behind.

“It was definitely not what I wanted to do,” said Wesenberg, a first-time Olympian. “To mess up corner two in both runs is pretty disappointing since I’d been working on that earlier this week and thought I had it. For some reason, I just missed slightly on both of them and paid for it in three. It felt really good the other day, so I was stoked to take it out of training and come in tonight, but it’s just not there. Something about it isn’t clicking for me.”

Saturday’s runs will begin at 4:20 a.m., Denver time.

Results after two of four heats:

1. Jacqueline Loelling, Germany, 1:43.86 (51.74, 52.12);
2. Janine Flock, Austria, 1:43.88 (51.81, 52.07);
3. Lizzy Yarnold, Great Britain1:43.96 (51.66, 52.30);
12. Katie Uhlaender, Breckenridge 1:44.73 (52.33, 52.40);
17. Kendall Wesenberg Modesto, Calif. 1:45.73 (52.77, 52.96);

PyeongChang current time

Mikaela Shiffrin won a gold medal in the giant slalom and Lindsey Vonn is set to make her PyeongChang Olympic debut. The Denver Post����ap John Meyer answered your questions about Olympic Alpine skiing in the Lunch Special. Here are the highlights:

How realistic of a shot does Mikaela Shiffrin have at bringing home five gold medals this year? Those delays have really put a crunch on her schedule.

John: She has decided not to race the super-G because the compression of the schedule due to weather delays took away her opportunity to rest and train after her first two events. So, no super-G. I would put my money on her for gold in tonight’s slalom. I think she will win a medal in alpine combined next week and gold is within her grasp. In downhill, I think she can win a medal but not sure she can claim gold, especially since the other downhillers raced on that course last year and she didn’t.

Can Lindsey Vonn win a gold medal this year?

John: Oh, yes. I like her chances for two medals and gold is definitely in her grasp, especially in downhill. Watch her very friendly rivalry with Italy’s Sofia Goggia. On that course last year, Goggia won DH and SG and Vonn finished second in both races — by a combined 0.11 of a second.

What is Mikaela Shiffrin’s ceiling? I mean, she’s accomplished so much at such a young age. Can she keep growing as a competitor or will she cap out soon?

John: I see her at the top of the world for several years because she loves what she does, so motivation won’t be a problem. I don’t want to jinx her, but it’s probably inevitable that she will suffer an injury at some point that prematurely ends a season and requires a difficult comeback. Keep in mind, we talk a lot about Lindsey Vonn’s injuries the past five years, but before 2013 she was the rare ski racer who never had a knee blow-out. Then she had two in a nine-month period. Anyway I see her breaking all of Lindsey’s records.

Is this Lindsey Vonn’s last Olympics?

John: Yes. But she will race at least one more season. She wants that World Cup wins record. She’s at 81 now and only 86 behind record holder Ingemar Stenmark.

Who are Mikaela’s biggest obstacles from winning her events?

John: Nothing is impossible for her. But in downhill, she’s still inexperienced compared to the women with whom she will be racing. Experience is huge in downhill. And in alpine combined, I don’t see her being denied a medal.

How much of a shot do you give Katie Uhlaender for getting a medal?

John: A good one. She’s been training well on that course, so I think she’s figured out the course. If she can race freely and not be too bottled up with nerves, she could be in there. That would be a beautiful story, of course, because she finished fourth four years ago by only 0.04 of a second, then found out the Russian woman who took the bronze was a doper.

Beyond Shiffrin and Vonn, are there any other Americans who could medal in the Alpine?

John: Ted Ligety in giant slalom. He is the reigning Olympic champion. He’s coming off a knee injury (two years ago) and back surgery (last year), and it’s taken him a while to get back up to speed but he was on a World Cup podium recently.

Will we see more of Wiley Maple?

John: Unfortunately no. I checked the start list for tonight’s super-G and he is not on it.

What other Olympic sports are you looking forward to watching outside of Alpine skiing?

John: Uhlaender in skeleton. The Steamboat guys in Nordic combined. Cross country skiing. I’m old school.

Is Lindsey completely recovered from her injury? She looked good in her last few races, but will she be hindered in the Olympics?

John: I think so. She recently referred to her right knee — the one she injured twice in 2013 — as “my poor knee.” But I do not think it will hinder her. You probably know that there is only one thin spot in her record. For all of her success on the World Cup and at world championships, she has only those two Olympic medals from 2010. I think she will do everything in her power to medal in downhill and super-G this time around.

What’s up with Bode Miller’s commentary? He sounds like a wooden board.

John: I’m in the minority here, apparently. I saw some comments on our Facebook Group last night (“Let’s Talk Olympics”) and apparently a lot of people feel the way you do. I actually like his commentary very much, but I guess that comes from knowing him for 19 years. That’s the way he speaks, and I think his commentary is super insightful. I understand why you might not like it, though. I love Tony Romo on football and he’s the opposite. I love his enthusiasm.

Who are some up-and-coming stars we should be on the look for in 2022?

John: Honestly, that is a concern for the U.S. in alpine. What happens when Vonn and Ligety retire? Mikaela will keep winning, but there aren’t a lot of encouraging results out there from other skiers.

How come there’s such a delay between the end of the race and the medal ceremony?

John: Not 100 percent sure but it’s probably because they want medals distributed in PyeongChang and the skiers are competing a ways away in the mountains. For example, I made my 30 miles down from the mountain cluster four years ago to see Mikaela get her slalom gold the following night. I had a one-on-one interview with her that night.

This is a ways down the road, but when it’s all said and done, could Mikaela become the greatest skier of all time?

John: Absolutely. I think she will. I mean, consider that Lindsey Vonn has 81 World Cup victories at age 33 and Mikaela has 41 at age 22. Consider that she already has four world championships medals and two Olympic medals with more to come over the next week. Yes, unless she suffers some strange injury that forces her into early retirement, she will go down as the best.

Seems like Mikaela always comes through when she’s under pressure. Am I right?

John: She has NEVER failed to come through under pressure on the sport’s biggest stage when she was “supposed” to accomplish something. Consider:

She went to the 2013 world championships (at age 17) as the favorite in slalom because she was leading the World Cup slalom standings. She won the gold medal.

She was the favorite in slalom at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. She became the youngest Olympic slalom champion (18) in history.

She was the favorite in slalom at the 2015 and 2017 world championships and she claimed gold medals. In 2015 she carried the added pressure of doing it at Beaver Creek, four miles from where she lives in EagleVail.

She was “supposed” to win a medal Thursday in giant slalom, based on the fact that she took silver in GS at last year’s world championships and is third in the World Cup GS standings. She didn’t just win a medal, she took the gold.

She is supposed to claim another gold in slalom tonight. I wouldn’t bet against her. If she wins gold tonight, I’m going to call her the greatest clutch performer in skiing that I’ve seen in 30 years of covering the sport.

I grew up skiing in Vermont and am a happy transplant to Colorado going on 24 years. I love to ski, and when I observe Mikaela, I see her Vermont pedigree of skiing the ice shining through. I just like to remind my fellow Coloradans that we Vermonters (and ex-Vermonters like me) are willing to share her with you from the Centennial State, but she learned to race in Vermont, so she is ours!

John: Yes, she learned a lot racing there. When she was just emerging as a star, I asked her about her amazing ability to hold a “quiet” upper body position in slalom. All the movement came from the waist down. She answered that there were two reasons: Skiing the trees in Vail as a kid, because if he weren’t quiet in the upper body you might bang an arm on a tree, and the coaching of Kirk Dwyer at Vermont’s Burke Mountain Academy.

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PyeongChang current time

Four-time Olympian Katie Uhlaender barely missed a medal in skeleton sliding four years ago when she finished fourth, just 0.04 of a second behind bronze medalist Elena Nikitina of Russia. Then she thought she might get that medal at these Olympics after Nikitina was stripped of her medal three months ago for having been part of her country’s state-sponsored doping program.

That won’t happen because Nikitina’s results were restored two weeks ago by the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Switzerland, a highly controversial decision.

Now Uhlaender is focused on her event, which will take place overnight Denver time on Friday and Saturday, and she has done well during training runs the past two days. She has finished eighth, third, third and fourth. Both of her third-place finishes were less than 0.3 seconds behind the pacesetters.

“I think I got the lines set, I just need to be smoother,” Uhlaender said. “I have to focus on my own game. I didn’t realize I was going that fast and I need to try to not think about it. I just need to have faith.”

Uhlaender said she believes she found her “sweet spot” for the current temperature of the ice, but she may need to adjust if conditions change.

“If it gets colder, that’s where I have to take a risk,” Uhlaender said. “I feel like if I pray on it and sleep, God will reveal what I should do. I just can’t let my own brain get in the way.”

The other U.S. slider, Kendall Wesenberg of Modesto, Calif., is a graduate of the University of Colorado. Many of her friends and family are en route to watch her compete.

“Some of them are here, or at least in Korea, already, but I honestly don’t know where most of them are right now,” Wesenberg said. “It’s awesome to have people coming and is so cool to have people here, but I’m the type of athlete where I focus on what I need to do until the race, and then enjoy that side of it afterwards.”

One more day of training will take place Wednesday.