By Gareth James

Laura Deas is facing a second day battle to bag a top 10 spot at the BMW IBSF World Skeleton Championships in Germany.

Wales’ 2018 Olympic bronze medalist was 18th after the opening two of her four runs in Altenberg.

The reaming two rounds take place on Friday.

Deas, whose best result in the World Cup series was fifth, was 20th after clocking one minute exactly on her first run after an issue mid-way through.

That’s Day 1 done for the female skeleton sliders at the 🌍 Championships in 🇩🇪: home favourite Loelling leads from Nikitina & Hermann, with @Pitterbread1 13th, @skeletonlaura 18th & @BroganCrowley 23rd for 🇬🇧. They go again at 8am GMT tomorrow #worldchamps

— British Bobsleigh and Skeleton Association (@The_BBSA) February 11, 2021

The 32-year-old went quicker next time out, her time of 59.45 the 16th best of the second run leaving her 18th overall.

Deas’s total time of 1:59.45 leaves her 2.71 secs behind Germany’s Jacqueline Loelling, the 2018 Olympic silver medalist, who leads the competition on 1:56.74.

Russia’s Elena Nikitina is second (1:56.85) just 0.11secs back with Germany’s defending champ Tina Herman in third (1:56.98)

Of the other Brits, Ashleigh Pittaway is 13th (1:58.24) and Brogan Crowley 23rd (2:00.47).

The championships is the last four round event before next year’s Winter Olympics in Beijing where Deas is hoping to add to her bronze from South Korea.