Skeleton-US bidding for world and Olympic team double

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 5 : The United States is the most successful skeleton nation in Winter Olympic history but with most of those medals now gathering dust, the arrival of the new mixed relay at Cortina is a timely opportunity to get back on the podium.

The two American men's golds came in 1928 and 2002, with the solitary women's gold also coming on home ice in Salt Lake City 24 years ago. Sochi 2014 brought a silver for Noelle Pikus-Pace and a bronze for Matthew Antoine, but they were the only medals secured in the last six Olympics.

So it was a boost for the country when Mystique Ro and Austin Florian unexpectedly won the mixed team world championship in Lake Placid last year, ending the grip of Germany who had won the previous four editions and raising hopes of a first American Olympic skeleton gold overseas for 98 years.

"I think the mixed relay is a really great opportunity to add another element to skeleton," Ro told a news conference in Cortina on Thursday.

"We're a very individualistic sport, but to now have a team component with another complexity that's from my background in track and field, a reaction start, I think it's really helpful and fun to bring the team together to try to experience something else, and it's another medal opportunity for us."

The pair also finished third in the World Cup this season.

"It's obviously an event that we've been pretty successful at the last few years since its inception, and to go into the Olympics in the first year of it being the world champions is a pretty cool thing," Florian said. "We're going to try to take the momentum from that and this past season into that and try to put a good race down."

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Also competing in the singles is Kelly Curtis, who has