Winter Olympics: Up in the Olympic village at Sestriere, Ireland's Winter Olympic team continues to prepare quietly and diligently. Like many nations operating under the distinct disadvantage of having no snow - and an ice mass sufficient only to keep cool Friday evening gin and tonics - the Irish are not expected to feature on the medal table in Torino.

However, the exploits of Clifton Wrottesley, edged out of Olympic bronze by just 0.32 of a second in the skeleton four years ago, remain fresh in the memory.

"I don't think we should expect any miracles, but we are hopeful of putting in some very good performances," said Wrottesley, the chef de mission for Ireland this year.

Although Ireland does not compete until Friday, when Rory Morrish goes in the cross country skiing and Dave Connolly features in Wrottesley's discipline, it has been a hectic week. Transport has been a continual problem in Turin. The Irish made it back from the opening ceremony down in the city at around 2am and every day since then has been a series of obstacles.

"The thing about the Olympics is that it is a question of routine and familiarity. Once you disabuse people of the notion that there is a bottomless pit of resources here and that you have to fit into a system, then it makes sense.

"The skiers (Thos Foley and Kirsty McGarry) left immediately after the opening ceremony because you cannot get quality practice time on the slopes here, the demand is too great. But Rory has been checking out the cross country course and just this morning, Dave had a first run on the skeleton track.

"And it's important that our athletes just get to know the competition venue so that they don't step up on race day and suddenly there's 10,000 people watching them and they freeze. It has been busy, but we are working towards it."

Although Wrottesley has not slid competitively in three years, he occasionally took the plunge when training Connolly and his Irish team-mate Pat Shannon, "just to stop them getting complacent. I was somewhere between rusty and terrible, but it helped keep them sharp."

He describes the skeleton track at Cesana Pariol as, "pretty testing in that it sorts out the drivers from the gliders.

"In other words, it should suit racers with a good start and those who work the track, which is Dave's style. So it could suit him. Of course, the difficulty is his lack of experience, but he has already posted a new personal best here in training without actually pushing too hard in his sprint start."

Ireland have teamed up with South Africa, Bermuda and Britain to maximise the resources available to them.

"Because of that, we are probably as well equipped as any country. And on the ground, people are fantastic. It is just that, overall, there have been some headaches and it is not as smooth as we would have hoped. But that is the Olympics."