SKI star TJ Baldwin, from Tharston, has stormed back to winning ways after a six-week lay-off through injury. The 18-year-old was first overall in the English Alpine championships Giant Slalom in Bormio, Italy.

SKI star TJ Baldwin, from Tharston, has stormed back to winning ways after a six-week lay-off through injury.

The 18-year-old was first overall in the English Alpine championships Giant Slalom in Bormio, Italy.

The championship was also a FIS international race open to all, with skiers from 18 nations competing.

TJ easily beat his fellow GB competitors by a massive margin of over 2.5 seconds. He also beat all the skiers from those 18 nations including Austria, Italy, Germany and Switzerland. In doing so he also scored his best ever FIS World ranking points in a Giant Slalom (GS) event - 36.10.

This followed on from his disappointment the previous day when he crashed out of the slalom race on the second run. 'I skied pretty well putting two very solid runs together. There were just a couple of small mistakes so I can still go faster,' said TJ. 'Although I am a bit disappointed I am really pleased with how things have gone since my return from injury. My knee is still a little bit tender but is getting stronger by the day.'

TJ's FIS points score of 36.10 is also under the 40-point mark set by the GB team for automatic selection for the World Junior championships in March.

The previous week saw TJ also score his best-ever FIS world ranking points in both Slalom and GS (at that time) in four races held in Austria and Slovenia.

He was placed 12th in two FIS Slalom races in Slovenia scoring a 36.12 & a 37.77 respectively.

Following on from those he scored a 38.35 in a very tough FIS GS race in Austria, then finished ninth in another FIS GS race in Slovenia, scoring a 37.70.

TJ is now back at the No1 spot for British Juniors (U21) in both Slalom & GS to go with his No1 ranking in Super G. They have also guaranteed his selection for the World Junior champs, being the only GB team member to have qualified as of right.

'My slalom skiing has come on great in the past few months and these results show that. I'm very happy that I've managed to get all these results below the World Juniors cut-off. I'm really looking forward to those.'

TJ is sponsored by Sunfold Systems of Wymondham and Chillspeed of Diss.