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"If a guy is beating you week in, week out, you start to feel it is an impossible task."

Dave Ryding is Britain's top alpine skier. After a decade of having to settle for second best, life just got "easier".

The retirement of the great Austrian Marcel Hirscher brings to an end a career that has brought two Olympic golds, 11 World Championship medals and a record eight successive World Cup titles.

For Ryding, it presents an opportunity.

Despite global success in other skiing disciplines including freestyle and telemark, Britain has never had anyone win at an Alpine Ski World Cup event.

Ryding has come close, with two second places in World Cup races - at Kitzbuhel in 2017 and in Oslo last season.

His time is now. This Sunday, he races in the season's first Alpine Ski World Cup slalom event at Levi, in Finland.

"When Marcel was racing, you did feel you were aiming for second at best - so the fact he is no longer racing does make it easier for everyone," Ryding tells ´óÏó´«Ã½ Sport.

"My aim is to be on the podium at every race this season and my ultimate goal is to win one. It's time to step up now and take more risks."

The 32-year-old Lancastrian was leading the slalom in Levi after the first run two seasons ago but hit a rut in the second run and crashed out. This weekend sees the season start in the northern Finland ski resort.

"It was a bitter pill to swallow as I was so close to a first World Cup win and it did take me a while to get over it," he says.

"But I like the hill at Levi, so let's see how this weekend goes."

Ryding has been on the World Cup scene for a decade, improving his ranking each year to now sit in the top 10.

He was a relatively late starter, trying skiing for the first time on a dry slope at Pendle Ski Club in Lancashire aged six, and first competing on snow aged 12.

"I did suffer from imposter syndrome at the beginning of my career as I was not expected to be any good coming from dry slopes compared to those from traditional alpine nations who had grown up on the snow," he says.

"But year by year I have worked hard and proved I could compete with the best."

Ryding will be 35 when the Beijing Winter Olympics come around in 2022.

It will be his fourth Games, and he will be aiming to better his ninth-place finish in Pyeongchang.

"In the last two Games, the slalom gold medallists were 34 and 35, so I'll be at my peak," he says.

"Because I started skiing later I haven't had the wear and tear on my body a lot of other skiers have had. There are skiers in their 20s who have skied more times than me.

"I've always had a good fitness programme and as I get older, I know the importance of doing my recovery and stretching."

Ryding, an avid supporter of Liverpool FC, is committed to this Olympic cycle and will make a decision on his future once that has finished.

He is already preparing for a life off the slopes by opening a cafe in Tarleton, near Preston, with his fiancee, Dutch former skier Mandy Dirkzwager.

"I wanted a taste of what the real world was like and also wanted to do something outside of skiing to keep my mind fresh," he says.

This summer he took an extended break from the snow and his first session back on skis was one run by his father Carl at an indoor snowcentre in Manchester.

"I hadn't been on skis for 10 weeks over the summer which is the longest break I've had," he said.

"As soon as I was back skiing, I loved it and realised how much I love the sport."

Ryding was mixing it with children who are aiming to emulate his achievements in the future, so were any starstruck?

"I was just getting stuck into the training so didn't really notice but I hope some were," Ryding said.

"I would have been at their age if an Olympian came to my training session!"