From Winterberg, GER
(March 3, 2024) – Francesco Friedrich broke the Winterberg track record in the first heat. In the third heat he lowered it by another hundredth on his way to a dominating victory in the 2024 IBSF World Championships four-man bobsled competition.
Friedrich carried a .27 second lead over Johannes Lochner after two runs. In the third heat, Friedrich’s drive was nearly flawless and that, coupled with just a few slight wall taps by Lochner, put Friedrich up by .63 going into the final heat.
On that final run Friedrich once again had the quick run of the heat, though this time not a track record, and that was more than enough to give the team of Friedrich, Thorsten Margis, Alexander Schüller and Felix Straub gold.
The victory for Friedrich was his sixth straight four-man championship. Including the Olympics he has won eight straight. The win also came in his 100th top-tier (World Cup, World Champs, Olympics) four-manbobsled start.
Friedrich’s last four-heat bobsled loss was to Latvia’s Oskars Melbardis in the 2016 World Championships in Igls, where Melbardis came from behind to win by .04. The only other active pilot from that race? Johannes Lochner.
Lochner and his team were basically on an island by themselves, well ahead of everyone else but Friedrich, but well behind Friedrich. Lochner’s squad gave him the second quick start in each heat on Lochner’s way to his fourth four-man World Championships medal with a silver.
There was one medal that was realistically up for grabs coming into the third heat, and that was for bronze. Germany’s Adam Ammour led Latvia’s Emils Cipulis, Austria’s Markus Treichl and Great Britain’s Brad Hall coming into the heat.
After the third run Ammour saw his lead over Cipulis shrink to .05, with Treichl and Hall a bit farther on the outside looking in. Neither Hall nor Treichl could challenge Cipulis’s team to move up.
Then it was Ammour’s turn, and the German held serve with to win bronze and give Germany a second medal sweep in as many days with a final run that was only matched by the winner.
Cipulis finished fourth, his second top four finish in as many championships.
Austria’s Markus Treichl’s squad out-pushed the British team in the last heat by .03, and that start was the difference in the race as Treichl’s run was a little messier than Halls, but enough to hold fifth place by .02.
Great Britain’s Hall’s team overcame a late start draw in the first heat to work their way up the order throughout the race, and they eventually finished sixth, just behind Treichl.
Italy’s Patrick Baumgartner finished in seventh place for his career-best four-man championships finish.
Simon Friedli was the top Swiss pilot in the field with an eighth place finish, up from ninth overnight. He picked off Kaizhi Sun of China, who finished ninth.
Cedric Follador finished tenth for his second straight top-ten finish in a four-man World Championships.
Canada’s Taylor Austin came into the third heat in 12th place, up from 16th in the first heat. While he wasn’t able to move up in the second day, Austin put down a pair of clean runs to hold onto 12th place.
Like Austin, USA’s Frank Del Duca was back in the field, 18th in his case, after the first heat. A wildly quick second run, fifth in the heat, was enough to move the team up to 14th overnight. The third heat saw Del Duca make another move up to 13th where the American squad finished.
Adam Baird of Great Britain finished 18th in his first World Championships as a pilot with his fourth run the quick one, one spot ahead of Martin Kranz and Lichtenstein in 20th.
Results:
| Pos | Names | Nation | Bib | Run 1 | Run 2 | Run 3 | Run 4 | Total |
| 1 | Friedrich / Margis / Schüller / Straub | GER | 1 | 53.12 | 54.06 | 53.11 | 53.81 | 3:34.10 |
| 2 | Lochner / Bauer / Bruckert / Fleischhauer | GER | 3 | 53.29 | 54.16 | 53.47 | 54.06 | 3:34.98 |
| 3 | Ammour / Ammour / Hertel / Schenk | GER | 11 | 53.70 | 54.23 | 53.50 | 53.88 | 3:35.31 |
| 4 | Cipulis / Springis / Miknis / Lindenblats | LAT | 2 | 53.58 | 54.40 | 53.49 | 53.99 | 3:35.46 |
| 5 | Treichl / Stepan / Sammer / Huber | AUT | 7 | 53.73 | 54.35 | 53.59 | 54.01 | 3:35.68 |
| 6 | Hall / Greenwood / Lawrence / Cackett | GBR | 17 | 53.92 | 54.26 | 53.54 | 53.98 | 3:35.70 |
| 7 | Baumgartner / Fantazzini / Mircea / Bilotti | ITA | 5 | 53.81 | 54.43 | 53.89 | 54.03 | 3:36.16 |
| 8 | Friedli / Schläpfer / Rolli / Haas | SUI | 4 | 53.85 | 54.84 | 53.89 | 54.10 | 3:36.68 |
| 9 | Sun / Ding / Ye / Ding | CHN | 8 | 53.98 | 54.65 | 54.07 | 54.32 | 3:37.02 |
| 10 | Follador / Vögele / Hufschmid / Jones | SUI | 6 | 53.99 | 54.76 | 54.03 | 54.34 | 3:37.12 |
| 11 | Li / Wei / Zhu / Zhen | CHN | 10 | 54.16 | 54.56 | 54.26 | 54.35 | 3:37.33 |
| 12 | Austin / McEwan / Couturier / Murray-Lawrence | CAN | 20 | 54.52 | 54.37 | 54.24 | 54.36 | 3:37.49 |
| 13 | Del Duca / Adams / Mitchell / Abdul-Saboor | USA | 22 | 54.64 | 54.34 | 54.27 | 54.38 | 3:37.63 |
| 14 | Rohner / Mariani / Hersperger/ Jullard | SUI | 13 | 54.20 | 54.80 | 54.35 | 54.41 | 3:37.76 |
| 15 | Behounek / Dobes / Bures / Wijas | CZE | 15 | 54.66 | 54.50 | 54.45 | 54.38 | 3:37.99 |
| 16 | Wesselink / Franjic / Franjic / Huis in ‘t Veld | NED | 16 | 54.44 | 54.70 | 54.49 | 54.73 | 3:38.36 |
| 17 | Mandlbauer / Hanschitz / Nichols-Bardi / Zech | AUT | 14 | 54.45 | 54.51 | 54.40 | 55.02 | 3:38.38 |
| 18 | Baird / Hullah / Milward / Dixon | GBR | 21 | 54.57 | 54.77 | 54.67 | 54.39 | 3:38.40 |
| 19 | Variola / Batti / Ceresatto / Obou | ITA | 18 | 54.91 | 54.45 | 54.53 | 54.94 | 3:38.83 |
| 20 | Kranz / Tschofen / Lenherr / Bertschler | LIE | 23 | 55.22 | 54.94 | 55.09 | 54.78 | 3:40.03 |
| 21 | Boron / Sienkiewicz / Sosna / Boinski | POL | 19 | 55.31 | 55.67 | 55.40 | 2:46.38 | |
| DNS | Kalenda / Ungurs / Kaufmanis / Klava | LAT | 9 | 54.01 | 55.88 | DNS | ||
| DNS | Tentea / Dinescu / Pacioianu / Iordache | ROU | 12 | DNS |