My name is James Barrow, I am 18 live in Bath and  I am currently studying sports performance at Bath university. I am on the British Snowboard Cross Team and have been for the past 3 years. My goal is to reach the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. I am british junior champion and I compete in FIS, europa cups, national championships competitions.

With the the excellent training facilities available at the university, When i am not out on the slopes I can train here. When I am on the slopes with the team we train wherever, this season we trained in Avoriaz on a snowboard cross track which was built there. I try and go to the mountains as much as possible in order for me to train and compete. But  this is very expensive with out any funding I can not go out as much as I need to progress.

I got into snowboarding because i was born in switzerland and I had mountains all round us. I initially started skiing when i was 20 months old, after skiing for a while until I was about 8, I tried snowboarding and never looked back, I love snowboarding and i have dedicated everything to it. My worst injury so far is a slipped disc in my neck in the season 2008/2009. After a long recovery I got back on my board and carried on doing what I love, snowboarding. I am now training as hard as I can in order to be at my peak performance for the 2014 Winter Olympics.

I hev entered a British airways competition, which if I win! will mean I get return flights to anywhere in the world. This is so important to me because I need to go to the junior world championships in New Zealand which is going to very expensive and am not sponsored yet!!!! it is extremely hard to fund this myself.

Being able to compete and represent my country at these championships would mean the world to me; as well as going to New Zealand, I  would also be able to use the prize to visit the mountains more to train with the team which as a result will ensure a better chance in qualifying for the Olympics.

In order for me to receive this I need your backing. Initially the judges choose people that they like best, these are the best 8 people. They choose them on the importance on winning the flights and the interest their profile has with the general public. Then if I get shortlisted it goes down to a general vote. and if I get the most votes I win!

I have been shortlisted twice before, but both times finished in 3rd due to me not getting enough votes. This is where I need you, it is so important to me, and I would really appreciate it if you could comment on my profile in order to show interest, which could get me shortlisted again and then if i do, I would need everyone to vote for me.

This means the world to me and i would be so grateful if you could do this favour for me. 

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