A gift: Birthday child Vanessa Mark (r.) is happy with pilot Lisa Buckwitz (Winterberg, March 2, 2024)
Last weekend the world was once again able to marvel at the German bobsleigh athletes and marvel at their technical upgrades. With their heavy skids, they won almost all the available medals in Winterberg, where the World Skeleton and Bobsleigh Championships were held this year from February 19th to March 3rd.
So that there are two bobsleigh competitions for women, the monobob became a fixture at world championships a few years ago. It is even mandatory at the Olympics if you also want to drive a two-man bobsleigh. At first, the Federal Germans found it difficult to get used to the variant. But that is now a thing of the past, because the German women are now also winning in the monobob. Lisa Buckwitz started the first two races at this year’s World Championships on February 24th with a furious start and immediately took the lead. But at world championships there are always four runs, so she had to go through the 1,609 meter long ice chute twice more.
Buchwitz’ third run on the Sunday before last was very weak; she hit the barrier twice in the ninth corner in the last run. So Laura Nolte, who drove more cleverly, won the title. The American Elana Meyers Taylor took second place. Until the all-important final run, Australian Breeana Walker seemed to have secured bronze. But she showed nerves and had a rough and erratic ride, so that Lisa Buckwitz took third place with the better time.
In the men’s two-man bobsleigh, everything was clear, there were no surprises: German winter athletes took all three places. Francesco Friedrich won the world championship title together with his pusher Alexander Schüller. The most successful bobsleigh athlete in history was able to hang on to his 15th gold medal – and also with three track records. The Ammour brothers Adam and Issam as well as Johannes Lochner with Georg Fleischhauer took second and third place. Lochner, who starts for BC Stuttgart, was still struggling with the neck injury from the fall in Altenberg.
The German women’s two-man bobsleigh crews also drove through the 15 curves of the track in Sauerland almost perfectly. Despite the warm temperatures, which made the track rougher and left small puddles in some places, there were no new falls from the best. Unfortunately, the international competition for women had no chance on the first day of the competition. At the end of the fourth run the placings were: Buckwitz, Nolte and Kim Kalicki. The best of the rest were the US team of Kaysha Love and the Australian Breeana Walkers with her pusher. Lisa Buckwitz, who won Olympic gold in Pyongyang in 2018 as Mariama Jamanka’s pusher, won gold this time as a pilot and was able to give her teammate Vanessa Mark a birthday present on March 2nd. After this triple victory, the national coach of the bobsleigh teams, René Spies, was able to smile mildly to himself. When asked what he was buying for the victories and for his birthday, he said quite calmly: “No alcohol!”
Finally, on Saturday and Sunday, the men’s teams of four raced through the fourth-oldest artificial ice rink in the world at a top speed of 140 kilometers per hour. It was inaugurated in Winterberg in 1977 and has already seen several European and World Championships. The fact that only Germans were on the podium in the four-man bobsleigh competition this time caused some disappointment. The Latvian crew led by pilot Emīls Cipulis would have liked to be rewarded with a bronze medal instead of their fourth place. The Chinese teams Chunjian Li and Kaizhi Sun also ended up “only” fighting for a place in the top ten. The Liechtenstein bobsleigh fans expected more than just second-to-last place from Martin Kranz and his crew. Oh yes, Francesco Friedrich won the four-man bobsleigh competition. It was his fifth double in the 100th race at his tenth four-man bobsleigh world championships. After a bumpy season, the perfectionist from Oberbärenburg was “prepared for the moment” (Friedrich about Friedrich) and left the teams of Lochner and Ammour behind.
All bobsleigh athletes now need to take a quick breather before preparation begins for the 2025 World Championships in Lake Placid and the 2026 Olympic Games in Italy. However, neither those in charge in Italy nor the Olympic Committee know exactly where the Olympic competitions in luge, skeleton and bobsleigh will take place.
