But the 2006 Winter Olympic silver medallist had left herself with too much to do having been sixth overnight after the first two of her four runs, and eventually had to settle for fourth place as silver went to Thees' team-mate Anja Huber and bronze to the last year's World Cup champion, Melissa Hollingsworth of Canada.

Rudman, this year's European bronze medallist, moved up from sixth overnight to fourth place in her first run of the day and produced her fastest effort of 52.22sec on her final run, but still finished 0.41sec adrift of Hollingsworth.

Thees, but she had left herself with a little too much to do to reach the podium.

Andi Schmid, British Skeleton performance director, said: "It was a bit of a copy of the last Olympics for Shelley when the first run killed her.

"She had a disappointing first run yesterday, but then she was just incredible.

"She couldn't have done much more today.

"It was a great performance today, she was second in both runs and was faster than Anja Huber on her home track, but she just left it a bit too late."

Team-mate Donna Creighton, who earlier this season ended her first campaign on the World Cup circuit by finishing sixth, came 13th overall at the World Championships.

She continued to produce some of the best starts of the championships but dropped down a place on her overnight position of 12th.

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