Keisha Hill, Staff Reporter

As he moved closer to realising his dream of representing Jamaica, Errol Kerr suffered mixed fortunes as he continued his preparation for the 2010 Winter Olympics, finishing 17th at the Lake Placid Ski Cross Freestyle World Cup in New York, at the weekend.

Kerr, 22, entered the finals with the second fastest time, qualifying from a field of 73 behind World Cup leader, Andreas Matt of Austria.

Cheered on by scores of Jamaicans who had travelled from Toronto and New York, Kerr, finished one-tenth of a second behind Matt and one-hundredth of a second ahead of former United States downhill champion, Daron Rahlves.

However, in the finals, Kerr, coming out of the start in his first heat, was in third place but crashed as he attempted to make a pass.

During the attempt, the course narrowed to six feet and Kerr got caught up in the traffic and crashed, going into the fencing. Luckily he came out unscathed.

Due to the crash, he dropped back to 17th.

"I have wanted to compete for Jamaica and have wanted to do it for a long time. Now I am finally getting a chance to and I want to put Jamaica on the map in skiing," Kerr told The Gleaner in an interview on Friday, as he was fine-tuning for the Lake Placid competition.

Yesterday, Kerr departed New York for the X-Games in Aspen, Colorado.

The X-Games is an invitation-only event for which 24 competitors were nominated for the ski cross. Kerr's fifth place result at the Winter X-Games of January last year guaranteed him an invitation to the 2009 Games.