I never thought I would win gold says Williams

Williams can expect to be hailed a national heroine when she returns home at the end of the Games having twice shattered the Whistler track record to claim Britain's first individual Winter Gold in 30 years.

But the 27-year-old Bath athlete, who admits winning the Olympic gold medal took her totally by surprise, says she cannot wait to get home and take a break from the sport that now promises to change her life.

Williams said: "I don't know when I'll get my life back, but I can't wait to go horse-riding again and do the things I stopped doing because I had to concentrate so hard this past year. I can't wait to do so-called normal things again."

Williams was presented with her gold medal on stage at the Whistler Medals Plaza on Saturday evening. It was the first time the Union Jack had been raised over a Winter Games podium since Rhona Martin's curlers struck gold in 2002.

She admitted afterwards she had been more nervous about the ceremony than she was about hurling herself head-first down the same sheet of ice on which Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili tragically died on the first day of the Games.

And she said she was struggling to comprehend the magnitude of her achievement, sifting through congratulatory messages, including one from Prime Minister Gordon Brown, and shuttling through an endless round of media interviews.

"I never thought I'd win an Olympic medal and it's not going to change me," said Williams. "I'm just happiest watching a film with my friends and that's what's important to me. I'll never lose sight of my normal life.

"A lot of my friends are athletes and we're our own little family. My friends have all got their own achievements which are just as good as mine but in their own worlds. I don't see myself as being any different."

Williams grinned her way to gold after shattering the Whistler track record with a time of 53.83 in her first run on Thursday. Having spent an apparently nerveless night's sleep, she returned to smash her own record with 53.68 in her third of four runs.

Barring calamity, it was almost enough to bag Williams's gold with a run to spare. A solid final run of 54 seconds flat helped her win the title with a huge

0.56-second advantage over

silver medallist Katerina Szymkowiak, with another German, Anja Huber, third.

Williams had claimed World Cup silver on the same track last year and continued to maintain her love for its controversial design in the wake of the luge tragedy and a series of crashes in men's bobsleigh.

It was all that could be expected of a natural thrill-seeker who admitted: "I guess I do have a bit of adrenaline junkie in me. Since I started skeleton I've started to find theme park rides a bit boring.

"I never searched skeleton out but at the same time I would never say no to trying anything. I've always wanted to challenge myself. When I was a kid I'd always go on the biggest rollercoaster. I just kind of take opportunities."

Her quest for the ultimate thrill had led the keen painter to put artistic ambitions on hold and devote herself full-time to the quest to join Alex Coomber and Sheffield-based Shelley Rudman as British Winter Olympic skeleton medallists.

It was a tough journey which began with the Bath student having to fork out her own money to go to a British skeleton talent-spotting camp in Lillehammer, Norway, and which frequently left her questioning if she had made the right choice.

Williams added: "Luckily I don't have to travel on trains and lug my sled round on my own any more. That's thanks to the success of the British skeleton team and the funding we've had to help upgrade our performances.

"There were loads of moments when I might have given up. I've had ups and downs, and some of the downs were so bad I just wanted to walk away. But this was my goal and my dream. I was never going to let one little setback put me off."

Williams maintains she is still in a state of bewilderment, waiting for the "bubble" to burst and the realisation to finally dawn that she has risen from relative anonymity to claim Olympic gold.

She said: "I love all my art stuff and I love horses and when I finish skeleton maybe I'd like to get back into all that. I know I need to keep my brain not 100 per cent on skeleton, and remind myself that there's another world out there."