Prussia: The goal is not to take as many athletes as possible to the Beijing Olympics

The goal is not to take as many athletes as possible to the Beijing Olympics, the Latvian Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation quotes Sandis Prūsi, the head coach of the Latvian bobsleigh team, on Friday.

In Bobsleigh and Skeleton, the World Cup and European Cup will start in the middle of November, but already in October, practically all leading athletes, including Latvia, will go to the Beijing Olympic Games ice rink. The composition of the Latvian team will start the new season, even the coach of the Latvian national team Sandis Prūsis has no clear answers.

At the end of the summer, it became known that pilot Ralph Bērziņš would not continue his bobsled career, but Olympic champion Oskars Melbārdis was again injured in a back injury, significantly reducing the chances of participating in the Beijing Olympic Games, which will take place from February 4 to 20.

Before the Games in Pyongyang last year, Uģis Žaļims was a little short of meeting the Olympic standards and Latvia could be represented with three crews.

“I know that athletes really want to go to the games. It’s a new experience, a new inspiration, but as a team leader I don’t aim to take as many athletes as possible to the Olympics. Our work will be judged by the first team’s results, not by how qualified , “points out Prussia.

“This does not mean that we are now throwing plinths in the bushes – we have two or three good pilots besides Oscar Ķibermanis, who will have to prove themselves in the new season,” says the experienced coach.

Last year, the young pilots Emīls Cipulis and Dāvis Kaufmanis felt the atmosphere of the World Cup in the doubles competition, but the quadruple competition for participation in the World Cup still lacks a sufficient number of successful qualifying races in the European Cup.

“Kaufman is in a better situation, he only misses one quadruple event in the European Cup with a result, so that he can also run in the World Cup, but Cipuli has about three or four. So I can’t say for sure what we will be in the first stage of the World Cup in Austria Maybe we will ride with only one crew, but it will all depend on how the boys have managed to start in the European Cup, “explains Prussia.

It is currently planned that Latvian bobsleighers will go to China on October 2, where they will spend more than three weeks, where they will also have the first ice training of this season. After that, the Ķibermanis team will spend a few days training in Sigulda, but after returning to Latvia, the European Cup team will go on to Norway, where there will be two competitions in each discipline on the Lillehammer track – in doubles and fours.

The World Cup season will start on November 15 in Eggs, where the competition will take place for two weekends in a row.

This season the World Cup season will take place only on European tracks – eight stages, four countries, five tracks. Also this year, one stage will take place on the Sigulda track, where skeletonists will conduct the competition on New Year’s Eve, but bobsleighers – on the first two days of the new year.

On January 16, the last competition of the World Tour will take place, but already in February, the most important matches of the four years will take place – the Beijing Olympic Games.