Winter Olympics 2018: Great Britain select a record 59 athletes for Pyeongchang

Katie Ormerod won bronze at the Winter X Games in Aspen last year

Great Britain will send their largest ever team to a Winter Olympics with 59 athletes heading to Pyeongchang.

It beats the 56 athletes who competed in Sochi four years ago and who returned with a record-equalling four medals, a gold, silver and two bronzes.

UK Sport has set a target of five medals in South Korea and believes up to 10 could be won.

Team GB's strongest chances come in skiing, snowboarding, short track speed skating, skeleton, bobsleigh and curling.

The final 25 athletes, which were skiers and snowboarders, were announced on Thursday.

Eleven of the squad will compete in freestyle skiing, with James Woods, Izzy Atkin and Katie Summerhayes leading the medal hunt.

Snowboarder Katie Ormerod, 20, is a contender in slopestyle and the new Olympic discipline of big air.

Isle of Man's Zoe Gillings-Brier, who has won seven World Cup medals, will be competing in her fourth Games.

Slalom skier Dave Ryding and cross-country duo Andrew Musgrave and Andrew Young are going to a third Olympics and both have chances to reach the podium.

'Most talented British team'

However, more than half of the squad will be competing at their first Games.

"We are going to be competing in more disciplines in Pyeongchang than we have before," said ski and snowboard team leader Dan Hunt.

"We have never had more athletes heading to an Olympics with genuine expectations about how well their performances will stack up against the best in the world."

Team GB chef de mission Mike Hay said: "Not only is this the largest team we've ever taken to a Winter Olympics but I feel it is also the most talented.

"Given results over the last two years at elite level, there is potential for success across a broader range of sports than ever before and I'm confident that with this group of athletes we can make history once again."

Ski and snowboard in full:

Alpine skiing: Charlie Guest, Dave Ryding, Laurie Taylor, Alex Tilley.

Cross-country skiing: Andrew Musgrave, Callum Smith, Annika Taylor, Andrew Young.

Freestyle skiing: Izzy Atkin, Murray Buchan, Rowan Cheshire, Alexander Glavatsky-Yeadon, Tyler Harding, Emily Sarsfield, Peter Speight, Katie Summerhayes, Molly Summerhayes, Lloyd Wallace, James Woods.

Snowboarding: Rowan Coultas, Aimee Fuller, Zoe Gillings-Brier, Billy Morgan, Jamie Nicholls, Katie Ormerod.

Full Team GB squad