Kaia Hatton - Great Britain's youngest luge athlete nominated for Gangwon 2024
Salzburg (FIL/14 Jan 2024) The first Winter Youth Olympic Games in Asia will start in ten days and 14-year-old Kaia Hatton is very excited. She will fly the flag for Great Britain at her first and only Youth Olympic Games Gangwon 2024.
She is the youngest British athlete ever to compete in the luge at the Youth Olympic Games, but she already has eight years of intensive training behind her, making her a serious contender.
#LugeLove
Hatton's move from London to Vancouver at the age of two proved crucial to her Olympic luge future.
"Here we have access to the ocean in the summer - with paddle boats it's good for balance training - and the mountains in the winter," explained Hatton.
Hatton's love of luge runs deep and was encouraged by her father, Mark Hatton. He is a two-time Olympic luge athlete for Great Britain, then coach of the Korean Olympic lugers, and now coach of Team GB.
Kaia Hatton tried luge for the first time at the age of six on the Olympic track in Whistler, Canada, and she hasn't looked back since.
"One day I just decided to try luge with my dad - and there I was on the world-famous Whistler Sliding Center's curve 13, one of the fastest and most challenging luge tracks in the world," says Hatton.
"I loved it right away, and I've been hooked ever since.
The Luge Family
Luge Canada, Canada's Olympic luge team, took Hatton under its wing at the Whistler Sliding Center in 2015.
"This is my home track, so I have a partnership with the Canadian luge team - everything fits," she said. "I'm very grateful for that and I feel very well integrated into the team. It's just that I'm competing in a Team GB suit and under a different flag. I'm very proud of that.
Hatton has been nominated by Team GB following brilliant performances in the YOG qualifiers at the World and Continental Junior Cups in Winterberg and Oberhof last month.
She can't wait to follow in the footsteps of her Olympic father. "I'm very happy to be representing the same country as my dad," said Hatton. "And the country of my grandparents."
Global cultural exchange
Hatton is looking forward to the opportunities the Winter Youth Olympic Games offer as an international sporting, educational and cultural festival for young people - she will join 1,900 athletes from 70 countries in Gangwon in 2024.
"2023 was my first time traveling internationally to train and compete - now I will be traveling to Asia for the first time in my life," said Hatton.
"I can't wait to get to the Youth Olympic Village. I'm looking forward to meeting athletes from so many different countries - and I hear the food is really spicy. I especially like that."
The Winter Youth Olympic Games will be held from January 19 to February 2. The luge competitions will be held at the Olympic Sliding Center in Pyeongchang, the site of the 2018 Winter Olympics.
"The Youth Olympic Games are like the Olympics for the little ones - I can't wait for the games to start."
