From Winterberg, GER
(February 22, 2024) – There are two world champions in the 2024 IBSF World Championships: Christopher Grotheer (2020, 2021) and Matt Weston (2023). And in this year’s championships, it looks like the 2025 World Champs will still only have two champions in it.
Christopher Grotheer and Matt Weston finished the first heat separated by .03, with Grotheer holding the advantage. Behind Weston, Felix Keisinger was the closest to them, already .35 out of second. Everyone else was a half of a second and farther behind, giving the race the looks of a two person race.
As with the women’s race, the track began to deteriorate about halfway through the run, which led to sliders moving up and down the leaderboard. But out front it was still Grotheer and Weston. Weston slid to the lead, ahead of two-time World Cup winner on the season Zheng Yin, who had moved up from seventh in the first heat. But Grotheer answered, and extended his lead by .01 to give the reigning world champ a .04 second advantage over the current world champ.
Behind the fight for gold, there’s an equally intriguing battle for bronze. Yin sits third, .73 out of the lead, but has Amedeo Bagnis in fourth, just .05 back. Axel Jungk moved up form tenth in the first heat to fifth and is only .12 behind Yin, while Marcus Wyatt sits sixth, just .02 behind Jungk.
Great Britain put on another strong performance, with all three of their sliders in the top eight. Behind Weston and Wyatt, Craig Thompson sits eighth after a tough second run dropped him down the order from fourth.
For the United States, Austin Florian led the way sliding to 12th place after two runs after entering the heat tied for the position with Vladyslav Heraskevych. Teammate Dan Barefoot slid to 21st after the first heat with a pair of clean slides.
Canada’s Blake Enzie goes to the second day of sliding in 24th place, just ahead of Spain’s Adrian Rodriguez.
Ukraine’s Vladyslav Heraskevych moved his way into tenth place after entering the heat tied for 12th.
Wenhao Chen was the big mover in the field after the first heat. After entering the second run in 15th, he moved up to ninth with quickest run of the second heat. Jungk had the second quickest run, .06 off of Chen’s pace.
Standings After Two Runs:
| Pos | Name | Nation | Bib | IBSF Rank | Start 1 | Start 2 | Run 1 | Run 2 | Total |
| 1 | Christopher Grotheer | GER | 1 | 1 | 4.98 | 4.94 | 56.76 | 57.54 | 1:54.30 |
| 2 | Matt Weston | GBR | 2 | 2 | 4.86 | 4.86 | 56.79 | 57.55 | 1:54.34 |
| 3 | Zheng Yin | CHN | 3 | 4 | 4.86 | 4.85 | 57.40 | 57.63 | 1:55.03 |
| 4 | Amedeo Bagnis | ITA | 8 | 8 | 4.81 | 4.80 | 57.28 | 57.80 | 1:55.08 |
| 5 | Axel Jungk | GER | 10 | 11 | 4.99 | 4.96 | 57.71 | 57.44 | 1:55.15 |
| 6 | Marcus Wyatt | GBR | 6 | 6 | 4.87 | 4.87 | 57.29 | 57.88 | 1:55.17 |
| 7 | Felix Keisinger | GER | 5 | 5 | 4.87 | 4.85 | 57.14 | 58.06 | 1:55.20 |
| 8 | Craig Thompson | GBR | 9 | 9 | 4.88 | 4.86 | 57.27 | 58.02 | 1:55.29 |
| 9 | Wenhao Chen | CHN | 7 | 7 | 4.87 | 4.85 | 57.94 | 57.36 | 1:55.30 |
| 10 | Vladyslav Heraskevych | UKR | 17 | 24 | 5.06 | 5.08 | 57.82 | 57.50 | 1:55.32 |
| 11 | Samuel Maier | AUT | 13 | 15 | 5.01 | 4.99 | 57.77 | 57.65 | 1:55.42 |
| 12 | Austin Florian | USA | 15 | 19 | 4.83 | 4.85 | 57.82 | 57.64 | 1:55.46 |
| 13 | Wengang Yan | CHN | 12 | 14 | 4.95 | 4.94 | 57.52 | 58.19 | 1:55.71 |
| 14 | Mattia Gaspari | ITA | 11 | 12 | 5.08 | 5.06 | 57.92 | 57.80 | 1:55.72 |
| 15 | Rasmus Johansen | DEN | 16 | 17 | 5.00 | 5.00 | 58.07 | 57.84 | 1:55.91 |
| 16 | Seunggi Jung | KOR | 4 | 3 | 4.82 | 4.79 | 57.62 | 58.30 | 1:55.92 |
| 17 | Jisoo Kim | KOR | 14 | 18 | 4.83 | 4.79 | 58.03 | 57.90 | 1:55.93 |
| 18 | Vinzenz Buff | SUI | 19 | 33 | 5.08 | 5.06 | 58.35 | 57.77 | 1:56.12 |
| 19 | Alexander Schlintner | AUT | 18 | 40 | 5.00 | 5.00 | 58.60 | 57.97 | 1:56.57 |
| 20 | Lucas Defayet | FRA | 22 | 60 | 5.01 | 5.02 | 58.67 | 57.91 | 1:56.58 |
| 21 | Daniel Barefoot | USA | 20 | 41 | 5.00 | 5.02 | 58.49 | 58.18 | 1:56.67 |
| 22 | Colin Freeling | BEL | 23 | 63 | 5.21 | 5.25 | 58.69 | 58.35 | 1:57.04 |
| 23 | Livio Summermatter | SUI | 21 | 46 | 4.92 | 4.91 | 58.99 | 58.13 | 1:57.12 |
| 24 | Blake Enzie | CAN | 24 | 29 | 5.06 | 5.01 | 59.13 | 58.14 | 1:57.27 |
| 25 | Adrian Rodriguez | ESP | 25 | 68 | 5.03 | 4.99 | 59.67 | 58.73 | 1:58.40 |
| 26 | Timon Drahonovsky | CZE | 27 | 48 | 5.22 | 5.28 | 59.80 | 59.85 | 1:59.65 |
| 27 | Yaroslav Lavreniuk | UKR | 30 | 53 | 5.22 | 5.21 | 60.22 | 60.50 | 2:00.72 |
| 28 | Akwasi Frimpong | GHA | 26 | 78 | 5.03 | 5.06 | 59.87 | 61.02 | 2:00.89 |
| 29 | Chun-Hung Chiang | TPE | 28 | 82 | 5.35 | 5.36 | 60.42 | 60.81 | 2:01.23 |
| 30 | Vladyslav Polyvach | POL | 29 | 64 | 5.19 | 5.24 | 60.79 | 60.86 | 2:01.65 |
| DNS | Ryan Kuehn | CAN | 31 | 32 | DNS |
