From Beijing, CHN
(February 6, 2022) – The best slider on the FIL World Cup tour all season had been Johannes Ludwig. The German led the World Cup points from wire to wire and clinched the overall title a race early. With that, he was expected to be a favorite in Beijing.
During training though, Wolfgang Kindl of Austria had been the quickest in many of the training runs, with Italy’s Dominik Fischnaller the quickest of his training group every day as well.
Come race time, Ludwig once again showed why he was the World Cup champion and a force to be reckoned with.
Ludwig entered the third heat just .039 ahead of Kindl, with Fischnaller in third. A strong trio of athletes were outside of the medals looking in, with two-time gold World Cup gold medalist Kristers Aparjods of Latvia, two-time Olympic gold medalist Felix Loch, and Latvian Gints Berzins all lingering around the top six with a shot at the podium.
There were effectively two races going on at the end of the event, with Fischnaller trying to hold back the field for bronze while Kindl and Ludwig fought for gold.
First up was the battle for bronze. Loch, the two-time Olympic gold medalist put down a time on his final run that was enough to leapfrog Aparjods and move him into a position no worse than fourth place. Fischnaller, who in 2018 missed out on a bronze medal by just .002, had the slide of his life on his final run. His trip down the track in Yanqing would be the third quickest of the heat and enough to give him the bronze medal by just under .2. Loch found himself just out of the medals in fourth, while Aparjods finished fifth.
With the fight for bronze out of the way, all attention was turned to the battle for gold.
On the third run Ludwig and Kindl had pulled away from the field, with the two men well ahead of anyone else. On that third run Ludwig opened up his lead over Kindl to .113 with both opening the gap even further between them and the battle for bronze.
On the final run Kindl went first and put down what was a nearly flawless run to solidify his spot as the Olympic silver medalist. Ludwig, however, would not be denied. The German, who had been the quickest in two of the first three runs, once again set the quick time of the heat to win the Olympic gold medal in men’s luge by .160 over Kindl. Fischnaller finished with a bronze medal, with Loch, and Aparjods rounding out the top five.
Germany’s Max Langenhan set the fastest time in the fourth run of those not on the podium to move into sixth.
As you would expect, the gold medal was a big deal for Ludwig.
“The gold medal means a lot to me,” he said. “I have a lot of years in this sport behind me and have had a lot of not so successful years. I didn’t qualify for the Olympics in either 2010 or 2014, and I had a lot of fourth places in world championships. The fun of this sport is one thing that I’ve always continued to enjoy so I’ve continued luging. And I feel like this medal is a sign that I did the right thing.”
Despite being the World Cup champion and a favorite to win, the pressure did not get to Ludwig.
“When I woke up this morning I’d gotten my seven hours of sleep,” Ludwig said. “I was just wondering is it right that I’m so relaxed today? I was a little bit worried about that. But as we got closer to the race I got a little more excited. But I feel like it was the right level of nerves!”
Ludwig tried to keep the race in perspective.
“To me these are called the Olympic Games. I told myself I’d try to see it like a game and just let things go. That was really the key to my success.”
David Gleirscher, the defending gold medalist from the Pyeongchang Olympic Games struggled to find consistency on the track in Yanqing. While he started his Olympic defense with a sixth place run, he struggled over the final three runs to finish 15th.
Chris Mazdzer, the defending silver medalist from Pyeongchang, was the top North American in the competition in eighth place. The American started his Olympics in tenth place and slowly moved his way up the rankings to eventually finish in eighth in what is likely his final Olympics.
Tucker West was up and down throughout his Olympic competition. After finishing the first run in 15th, he entered the third heat in 11th place. A big issue on his third run set him back as he eventually finished 13th. Jonny Gustafson rounded out the American effort in 19th, up from 20th in the third heat.
Australia’s Alexander Ferlazzo had a best ever Olympic finish in his third Olympic Games. His 16th place finish was his first ever time in the top 20 after finishes of 28th in Pyeongchang and 33rd in Sochi.
Reid Watts finished 17th as the lone Canadian in the field.
Results:
| Pos | Name | Nation | Bib | FIL Rank | Run 1 | Run 2 | Run 3 | Run 4 | Total |
| 1 | Johannes Ludwig | GER | 4 | 1 | 57.063 | 57.438 | 57.043 | 57.191 | 3:48.735 |
| 2 | Wolfgang Kindl | AUT | 1 | 2 | 57.110 | 57.430 | 57.117 | 57.238 | 3:48.895 |
| 3 | Dominik Fischnaller | ITA | 10 | 7 | 57.361 | 57.444 | 57.461 | 57.420 | 3:49.868 |
| 4 | Felix Loch | GER | 2 | 3 | 57.383 | 57.500 | 57.510 | 57.485 | 3:49.878 |
| 5 | Kristers Aparjods | LAT | 3 | 4 | 57.364 | 57.597 | 57.399 | 57.693 | 3:50.053 |
| 6 | Max Langenhan | GER | 5 | 5 | 57.606 | 57.536 | 57.521 | 57.429 | 3:50.092 |
| 7 | Gints Berzins | LAT | 7 | 12 | 57.414 | 57.709 | 57.480 | 57.570 | 3:50.173 |
| 8 | Chris Mazdzer | USA | 18 | 22 | 57.780 | 58.039 | 57.779 | 57.779 | 3:51.337 |
| 9 | Roman Repilov | ROC | 12 | 6 | 57.594 | 58.679 | 57.714 | 57.647 | 3:51.634 |
| 10 | Semen Pavlichenko | ROC | 8 | 9 | 57.786 | 58.115 | 57.955 | 57.793 | 3:51.649 |
| 11 | Leon Felderer | ITA | 24 | 16 | 57.814 | 58.211 | 57.855 | 57.960 | 3:51.840 |
| 12 | Nico Gleirscher | AUT | 6 | 8 | 59.110 | 58.351 | 57.370 | 57.452 | 3:52.283 |
| 13 | Tucker West | USA | 21 | 23 | 58.079 | 57.831 | 58.534 | 57.916 | 3:52.360 |
| 14 | Aleksandr Gorbatcevich | ROC | 16 | 13 | 58.139 | 58.339 | 58.080 | 58.043 | 3:52.601 |
| 15 | David Gleirscher | AUT | 11 | 10 | 57.407 | 58.240 | 58.908 | 58.617 | 3:53.172 |
| 16 | Alexander Ferlazzo | AUS | 22 | 30 | 58.216 | 58.994 | 58.112 | 57.887 | 3:53.209 |
| 17 | Reid Watts | CAN | 14 | 26 | 58.049 | 59.071 | 58.108 | 58.065 | 3:53.293 |
| 18 | Arturs Darznieks | LAT | 23 | 18 | 58.166 | 59.370 | 57.932 | 58.241 | 3:53.709 |
| 19 | Jonathan Gustafson | USA | 19 | 19 | 57.845 | 59.330 | 58.496 | 58.275 | 3:53.946 |
| 20 | Svante Kohala | SWE | 34 | 34 | 58.517 | 58.779 | 58.368 | 58.333 | 3:53.997 |
| 21 | Jozef Ninis | SVK | 15 | 25 | 58.205 | 58.764 | 58.856 | 2:55.825 | |
| 22 | Anton Dukach | UKR | 20 | 24 | 58.873 | 58.726 | 58.408 | 2:56.007 | |
| 23 | Rupert Staudinger | GBR | 26 | 39 | 58.731 | 58.960 | 58.622 | 2:56.313 | |
| 24 | Duoyao Fan | CHN | 25 | 46 | 58.848 | 58.883 | 58.895 | 2:56.626 | |
| 25 | Mateusz Sochowicz | POL | 35 | 48 | 58.863 | 59.196 | 58.867 | 2:56.926 | |
| 26 | Marian Skupek | SVK | 32 | 33 | 58.956 | 58.976 | 59.051 | 2:56.983 | |
| 27 | Andriy Mandziy | UKR | 13 | 28 | 61.082 | 58.706 | 58.346 | 2:58.134 | |
| 28 | Pavel Angelov | BUL | 33 | 42 | 59.555 | 59.753 | 59.545 | 2:58.853 | |
| 29 | Valentin Cretu | ROU | 17 | 29 | 58.349 | 58.362 | 62.223 | 2:58.934 | |
| 30 | Michael Lejsek | CZE | 30 | 39 | 59.542 | 59.945 | 60.080 | 2:59.567 | |
| 31 | Saba Kumaritashvili | GEO | 27 | 47 | 60.211 | 60.146 | 60.036 | 3:00.393 | |
| 32 | Seiya Kobayashi | JPN | 28 | 52 | 60.856 | 60.919 | 59.859 | 3:01.634 | |
| 33 | Namkyu Lim | KOR | 29 | 56 | 62.438 | 59.795 | 59.538 | 3:01.770 | |
| 34 | Mirza Nikolajev | BIH | 31 | 45 | 61.667 | 62.507 | 61.175 | 3:05.349 | |
| DNS | Kevin Fischnaller | ITA | 9 | 14 | DNS |