Team Ireland are hoping to have five representatives at the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics, but will have to wait until the end of the month before they can announce just who will be going.
With the qualification window for the only closing on Sunday, Irish athletes and officials face a nervous wait to discover how many places will be allocated to Ireland and in what disciplines.
With the Winter Olympics beginning on 6 February, it's an incredibly tight turn around and Chef de Mission for Team Ireland, Nancy Chillingworth, is gearing up for a hectic few weeks as preparations for the games step up.
Ireland are guaranteed to have one male and one female competing in alpine skiing, as well as representation in cross country skiing, but after that, things remain uncertain.
Chillingworth explained: "The final day of qualification for most sports was yesterday, so we're awaiting allocation of slots from the organising committee and then the national federations will have their meetings, nominate to us and then we'll select hopefully later this week.
"As it stands we’re confident of four athletes and hopeful that we’ll get a fifth across the line based on how results have gone across the last couple of days.
"We know that we’ll have athletics in cross country skiing and in alpine. We’re confident that we’ll receive a slot for freestyle skiing halfpipe and there’s a couple of other disciplines where we’re a bit more hopeful.
"The team announcement will either be late on the 29th or early on the 30th.
"Because of the weather and the conditions, the Winter Olympics always falls within the traditional competition season. So that does leave timelines very close and when you're a small team and you're just factoring in a couple of athletes, one or two make quite a big difference."
With the Ireland team announcement not excepted until a week before the start of the Games, Chillingworth admits that it can feel like a bit of scramble to get everything in place for Irish athletes.
That can be further exacerbated but the decentralised nature of the Winter Olympics with events spread across six Olympic Villages throughout the region.
"Myself and our sports director Martin Burke are heading over on the 27th," Chillingworth explained. "Because of the spread of the Games what we'll do is I'll lead to the west of Italy, he will lead to the east of Italy and between us we'll keep close contact to make sure the athletes are supported across the whole of the Northern Alps and Dolomites."
There's the real prospect that Ireland could have four different villages for a team of four athletes and given the limited resources of Team Ireland, they will be working with other countries to support athletes.
"From a Team Ireland perspective we have a collaboration with Denmark and Iceland around physio support," Chillingworth said.
"It's the first time we've done that so that we're working as a collaboration of physios to ensure that athletes are supported at the same level irrespective of what village they're in."
