2015 FIBT World Championships - Two-Man Bobsled

From Winterberg, Germay

It wouldn’t be Winterberg without weather playing a substantial factor in a race, and the first two runs of two-man bobsled saw weather come into play for both runs.

Franceso Friedrich is the leader going into Sunday’s third run. The German had two quick runs on home ice, and has a .46 second advantage over World Cup champion Oskars Melbardis.

Melbardis saw his first run down in heavy wind and snow. Once the snow cleared for his second run, Melbardis started moving up, finishing the day six spots higher than his first run in second. Teammate Ugis Zalims make two Latvian sleds in medal position going into the second day of races on Sunday.

Yunjong Won of Korea turned heads with his set of fourth place runs, while German Johannes Lochner sits fifth, just ahead of Rico Peter and Richard Oelsner who are tied for sixth.

The bad weather played with the bulk of the North American teams. Steven Holcomb’s first run was in the middle of a snow squall, and in his second he was the first sled down, acting as a bit of a snowplow for the field. Holcomb will come into Sunday’s race in 21st. Teammate Nick Cunningham had a spectacular second run to move into 15th place for the second day of racing. The third American sled, piloted by Codie Bascue, also moved up a few spots with a great second run from 26th to 24th.

The man who took the biggest beating by the Winterberg weather was Canadian Justin Kripps. Kripps had the first sled down the German track in heavy snow, and saw 29 sleds come down quicker than him in the first run. The second run, however, was much more Kripps-like, and the Canadian moved up 10 spots to 20th. Teammate Nick Poloniato saw a bit of a drop-off in his second run, falling from 12th to 14th, while Chris Spring moved up with a fantastic second run from 27th to 19th.

Lamin Deen put together quite possibly his best combination of runs of his career, and will go into Sunday’s racing in 12th place. teammate Olly Biddulph, in his first World Championships, finished Day 1 in 26th.

Results:

Pos	Names	Nation	Bib	Run 1	Run 2	Total
1	Friedrich/Margis	GER	4	56.47	56.08	1:52.55
2	Melbardis/Dreiskens	LAT	2	56.79	56.22	1:53.01
3	Zalims/Dambis	LAT	16	56.62	56.41	1:53.03
4	Won/Seo	KOR	10	56.63	56.46	1:53.09
5	Lochner/Bluhm	GER	9	56.73	56.41	1:53.14
6	Peter/van der Zijde	SUI	5	56.84	56.34	1:53.18
6	Oelsner/Franke	GER	30	56.51	56.67	1:53.18
8	Hefti/Baumann	SUI	3	56.92	56.38	1:53.30
9	Kibermanis/Leiboms	LAT	12	56.89	56.50	1:53.39
10	Andrianov/Mokrousov	RUS	18	56.76	56.66	1:53.42
11	Stulnev/Antukh	RUS	14	56.89	56.54	1:53.43
12	Deen/Williamson	GBR	21	56.93	56.57	1:53.50
13	Walther/Hübenbecker	GER	6	56.97	56.59	1:53.56
14	Poloniato/Barnett	CAN	17	56.93	56.65	1:53.58
15	Cunningham/Harrison	USA	11	56.97	56.63	1:53.60
16	Costerg/Heinrich	FRA	20	56.93	56.90	1:53.83
17	Kasjanov/Pushkarev	RUS	8	57.17	56.80	1:53.97
18	Luty/Tylkowski	POL	26	56.99	57.01	1:54.00
19	Spring/Plug	CAN	15	57.34	56.80	1:54.14
20	Kripps/Brown	CAN	1	57.58	56.68	1:54.26
21	Holcomb/Valdes	USA	7	57.10	57.27	1:54.37
22	Maier/Sammer	AUT	23	56.98	57.45	1:54.43
23	Rinaldi/Vainn	MON	19	57.04	57.43	1:54.47
24	Bascue/Victorian	USA	13	57.33	57.18	1:54.51
25	Wesselink/Brink	NED	24	57.36	57.20	1:54.56
26	Biddulph/Smallin	GBR	32	57.25	57.37	1:54.62
27	Matousek/Suchy	CZE	31	57.65	57.02	1:54.67
28	Fontana/Ughi	ITA	27	57.12	57.63	1:54.75
29	Vrba/Nosek	CZE	25	57.25	57.53	1:54.78
30	Radjenovic/Bundalo	SRB	29	57.25	57.54	1:54.79
31	Kim/Jun	KOR	22	57.52	57.35	1:54.87
32	Grigore/Craciun	ROU	28	57.60	57.77	1:55.37
33	Silic/Mezulic	CRO	33	59.41	59.78	1:59.19