Louise Corcoran NZ Skeleton Racer. Olympic Athlete. Kiwi. Skeleton Slider. Skeleton Sport

Basically, I haven’t been able to sprint, do any free weights, or sleep comfortably since. Thankfully x-rays have cleared any damage to the socket, but I have an appointment with an orthopedic surgeon just to make sure every thing is all OK. So frustrating. I haven’t been able to work either.

Since coming home from tour, I have been living in Wanaka, I initially went and worked up at the Snow Farm planting tussock grass, and I was still doing that when I hurt my self, but for the new owners of the proving ground. The Southern Hemisphere Proving Ground is the car testing area that has the ice which I train on in the winter here. I suspect there will be ice available soon as there is a nice dusting of snow on the tops of the mountains now.

The whole business of finding the funds to be able to go away and race has begun again, it is a never ending process, but I have a few good connections and we are working hard. This season, the Olympic season I will be traveling and training with, and being coached by the American team, this is such an amazing and generous offer that has been extended to myself, Kelly Moffat and Peter van Wees (from The Netherlands). But it does mean that I will need to find three times the amount of funds as I had last season. Traveling with the US team means no more couches and lounge room floors, no more noisy cramped back packers or beat up old ford escorts that need push starting every morning (Helga will live on in our memories for ever).

But it also means, top quality coaching, good food, clean accommodation, being surrounded by other motivated athletes, training with the best in the world, and having daily gym sessions (with a trainer) scheduled in to the program, this will make a huge difference for me, as it is the time in the gym while I am tour that gets sacrificed when things get too busy, too stressful, too expensive and too complicated.

This week I had a speaking engagement at Otago University, while I was in Dunedin for it, I met up with a friend of a friend, who is interested in helping me set up a trust to raise money. Ron has been involved in setting up trusts for several of New Zealand s top athletes from BMX, Rally Driving and Mountain Biking, it looks like the system works well for them, so I hope we can get it sorted for me too. I'll let you all know how it progress's....