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Women’s Skeleton Gold Medal winner, Tristan Gale, was always a spunky kid, eager to try anything new. Tristan’s first winter sport was skiing, but when her family moved to Salt Lake City she tried skeleton and was hooked by the end of her first downhill run!

Tristan qualified for the Olympics after just 4 years in skeleton competition. As she herself said, “…I train for speed and strength. That’s my life, every day.” And the 5′2″, 115-pound racer does need strength to carry her 80-pound skeleton sled to the slopes.

The gutsy sled racer was super excited about being in the Olympics, “I don’t even think the word excited begins to describe it, and I’ve used the word ‘excited’ about 800 times in the past week,” she bubbled.

Her enthusiasm was matched by a quiet assurance. Having trained the last four years right at the Utah Olympic Park, Tristan was confident, “I know this track. I’ve taken run after run in the snow and rain, the warm weather, everything.”

The 20-year old petite athlete likes to wear glitter whenever she races. But Tristan had always promised herself that if she made it to the Olympics she would color her hair too- red, white and blue! And sure enough, when the petite athlete concluded her winning run, she took off her helmet and shook out her patriotically streaked hair to the cheers of her fans. All that glitters may not be gold, but in this case the sparkling personality of Tristan Gale is a perfect match for the Olympic gold medal.