Commonwealth Games athlete Thérin and bobsleigh driver Nicola Minichiello, who has featured in two Olympics, completed their first competition together in the Americas Cup in Calgary, Canada, last week.
The two-woman bobsleigh team posted the second fastest start times in both runs to give them a podium finish in second place.
They beat seven other teams to the finish but failed to make it past Russia, who won the race by 0.56 seconds.
However, Thérin, who stated that she completely trusts her driver, even at speeds of 80 mph, said: ‘The race was quite scary.
I’m still not really used to the sensation of going down in the bobsleigh and I don’t really enjoy that bit very much! ‘I enjoy aspects of the sport, but I don’t really like going down because it’s just horrible, you don’t have any control and you get thrown about quite a bit.’ The 20-year-old former St John’s pupil is nonetheless looking forward to World Cup races in Italy, Austria and Germany and has impressed the Great Britain team so much that she said: ‘As it stands I’m definitely going to the World Championships in February based on the recent times that we have done.’ Javelin, shot and discus thrower Thérin, who is the ‘break woman’ in her sleigh, has the important role of building as much speed as she can at the start of the race and has therefore had to incorporate a lot more speed training than she would normally do for her athletics.
But this has not forced her to choose between her favoured sports: ‘I’m aiming to do both the bobsleigh and the javelin; the athletics season doesn’t start until May so I’ll be looking back to the javelin then but the bobsleigh is a winter sport so I’m hoping I can do both for now,’ she added.
Thérin, studying Sports Science in Wales, is now focused on her next bobsleigh event, the World Cup race in Cesana, Italy, in December.
