Winter Olympics: GB's Dom Parsons fourth after two runs of skeleton

Dom Parsons put himself in contention to win Great Britain's first medal of the 2018 Winter Olympics at the halfway stage of the men's skeleton.

The 30-year-old is fourth, 0.03 seconds behind Latvia's Martins Dukurs after setting a combined time of one minute 41.26 seconds in Pyeongchang.

South Korea's Yun Sung-bin leads on 1:40.35, with Nikita Tregubov, an Olympic Athlete from Russia, second and Briton Jerry Rice 12th.

The competition finishes on Friday.

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Parsons has 'more in the bag'

Parsons was joint fifth after clocking 50.85secs in the first run, completing the second in 50.41 to close the gap on his podium rivals.

He is aiming for an improvement in his start times after he twice posted 4.88secs - 0.2 slower than Dukurs in the second run.

"It's really close," said Parsons. "A small mistake down the track and you can lose a couple of tenths of a second and that's a few spots. Except for Yun, obviously. He's smashing it.

"There is a little bit more in the bag and hopefully I can put down another two good runs and just inch ahead of Martins - that's the goal."

The third run takes place at 00:30 GMT on Friday before the final run at 02:15.

Defending champion Lizzy Yarnold and team-mate Laura Deas begin their campaigns in the women's event on Friday.

Yun Sung-bin leads the skeleton by 0.74 seconds

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Parsons has 'real chance' of medal - analysis

Olympic gold medallist skeleton racer Amy Williams

Dom Parsons is so, so close. He's just got to hold it together. He's in a good place. The team's doing really well, and he just has to forget what's happened and go again.

He's got a real chance of a medal. It looks like he is in reach of a bronze or a silver if he can just get his start right.

Dom is getting on really well with the track. We've never had a medal for the men's skeleton.

In the women's event, Lizzie Yarnold and Laura Deas have been among the fastest in training. Lizzie's got the experience and Laura's been in great form, so there's real hope for them too.

It's not an arms race - Parsons on suit debate

Parsons was the fastest slider in Monday's second training run and the form of the British team during practice led to some rivals voicing concerns that Team GB's new aerodynamic suits may not comply with the sport's rules.

USA slider Katie Uhlaender questioned the legality of Britain's suits, but they have been cleared by the sport's governing body.

"I don't think it's an arms race; it's more that little extra edge," said Parsons, who finish fifth in the opening run before moving up a place on the second.

"Without getting the basics right you're not going to go fast, so the main focus of all the work we do is on the fundamentals of sliding and being able to get speed out of the sled, understanding the tracks and getting our lines down the tracks. That is the biggest thing."

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