Ski ace Emily Sarsfield to be face of charity tea

Jul 25 2010 by Neil McKay, Sunday Sun

SHE’S one of Britain’s top sportswomen and she admits to being “a bit crazy.”

That’s because Olympic hopeful Emily Sarsfield, 27, excels in ski-cross . . . the extreme sport in which competitors can block, push and obstruct opponents, all while negotiating obstacles at high speed and leaping from heights of 100 feet into the snow.

The sport, which became an Olympic event for the first time at Vancouver earlier this year, has been likened to “a cabbie in New York trying to race through traffic and not crash – wacky races and the Grand National on skis all rolled into one.”

Daredevil Emily, of Brancepeth, near Durham, who is ranked Britain’s top skier, missed the Vancouver Olympics due to a knee injury, but she’s hopeful of making Britain’s 2014 squad for Sochi, Russia.

And despite choosing a sport which had the potential to condemn her to the looks of a boxer at the end of a losing bout, Emily has been chosen as the cover girl for Lifeboat Tea.

A percentage of sales of the tea go to the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), the charity which is entirely funded through donations.

She said: “The RNLI does an essential job in protecting people enjoying the sea for sport or recreation. “I relish a challenge, but what the brave volunteers do to protect others is truly admirable. I look forward to helping raise awareness of the simple message ‘drink tea, save lives’.”