From Beijing, CHN
(February 19, 2022) – Laura Nolte dominated the two-woman bobsled contest, finishing well ahead of anyone else to win her first Olympic gold medal.
The German had walked away from the monobob event earlier in the week without a medal after a relatively disappointing showing by the young star. In the two-woman competition she showed why she’d been the winningest pilot over the past two World Cup season.
On the third run she and brakewoman Deborah Levi opened up her lead over teammates Mariama Jamanka and Alexandra Burghardt, from a half of a second to over three quarters of a second. Jamanka put down the quickest run of the fourth heat to try to put some pressure on Nolte, but Nolte was undeterred. Needing to simply come down the track clean, Nolte did just that to finish .01 behind Jamanka in the heat and ahead by .77 in the race.
The gold was the eighth in nine sliding events in Beijing for Germany.
During the medal ceremony, Nolte was seen shaking her head and laughing. Despite her success throughout the season, the Olympic win still hadn’t sunk in.
“I couldn’t believe it really,” she said. “I’m still speechless! I can’t believe we’ve made it, so really I just don’t know what to say, I’m just really happy!”
Jamanka’s silver gave her her second Olympic medal in two-woman competition after winning gold in 2018. After a disappointing showing in the monobob race Jamanka was thrilled with a silver medal.
“The monobob race wasn’t what I’d hoped for,” Jamanka said. “Of course I knew we had a better chance in the two-man sled, I feel better in it. But the monobob race was so bad that I was a bit desperate after that. It was a relief to win a medal to be honest!
The United States’ Elana Meyers Taylor finished third to make history as the first Black women to ever win five medals in the Olympic Winter Games. She and brakewoman Sylvia Hoffman set the start record in the first heat, broke it in the third heat, and slid to a bronze medal. The American duo had the third quickest run in all three heats to solidify their spot on the podium.
Meyers Taylor’s gold made her the first woman to ever win two Olympic bobsled medals in one Olympics.
“It’s incredible,” Meyers Taylor said of her Olympics. “I had no idea what to actually expect, and to actually have two opportunities…you know I always wanted to medal, but who knew if it could happen. It’s just a huge testament to the work Sylvia put in to get us here.”
Germany’s Kim Kalicki and 2018 Olympic gold medalist Lisa Buckwitz fell behind early in the four-run event and never could make up the ground to the podium. While they were able to move up from sixth, they stalled out at fourth place, where they finished.
Christine de Bruin rounded out the top five. Alongside brakewoman Kristen Bujnowski, de Bruin had a top six drive in each heat but was edged out of fourth by Kalicki on the final run.
Swiss pilot Melanie Hasler used a quartet of strong pushes by Nadja Pasternack to help her score four strong runs, including a third-quickest final run, to finish her first Olympics in sixth place.
Americans Kaillie Humphries and rookie Kaysha Love were quick off the top, but the race never came to Humphries as they finished seventh. Humphries will leave Yanqing with an Olympic gold medal in the inaugural monobob event from earlier in the week.
Humphries revealed after the race that she’d been racing with a calf injury. Despite that she said she did everything she could.
“It hurts, I won’t lie. I gave every ounce of everything I had to the last two days,” Humphries explained. “And I’m proud of the work that we put in and what we put into it. It sucks, and it’s infuriating to know that it wasn’t good enough, but at the end of the day that’s racing, and we can’t be fearful of not being the best.”
Just behind Humphries in eighth place was Cynthia Appiah and Dawn Richardson-Wilson. The Canadians were quick off the top and Appiah had likely her two best runs of the Olympics on Saturday. Despite a crash in the third run that kept her from moving up, Appiah’s final two runs were very quick and enough to hold onto eighth place. Teammates Melissa Lotholz and Sara Villani finished the race in 12th, up from 16th with a big third run.
Appiah’s fourth run was likely her best, afterward she said she wanted to finish strong.
“In this sport, you really have to live in the moment and process the mistakes as quickly as possible and move on because you’ve got another run,” she said. “I knew that for Dawn I couldn’t let her Olympic experience end on such a bad note, and for myself as well. I knew that the fourth run was go big or go home.”
Great Britain’s Mica McNeill set her two fastest times of the race on her two final runs to move up from 19th to 17th.
Results:
| Pos | Names | Nation | Bib | IBSF Rank | Run 1 | Run 2 | Run 3 | Run 4 | Total |
| 1 | Nolte / Levi | GER | 4 | 2 | 61.04 | 61.01 | 60.70 | 61.21 | 4:03.96 |
| 2 | Jamanka / Burghardt | GER | 9 | 6 | 61.10 | 61.45 | 60.98 | 61.20 | 4:04.73 |
| 3 | Meyers Taylor / Hoffman | USA | 8 | 1 | 61.26 | 61.53 | 61.13 | 61.56 | 4:05.48 |
| 4 | Kalicki / Buckwitz | GER | 5 | 3 | 61.61 | 61.78 | 61.30 | 61.59 | 4:06.28 |
| 5 | de Bruin / Bujnowski | CAN | 6 | 4 | 61.45 | 61.76 | 61.43 | 61.73 | 4:06.37 |
| 6 | Hasler / Pasternack | SUI | 11 | 14 | 61.65 | 61.85 | 61.77 | 61.56 | 4:06.83 |
| 7 | Humphries / Love | USA | 7 | 5 | 61.41 | 61.97 | 61.75 | 61.91 | 4:07.04 |
| 8 | Appiah / Richarson Wilson | CAN | 13 | 16 | 61.75 | 61.89 | 61.95 | 61.93 | 4:07.52 |
| 9 | Sergeeva / Belomestnykh | ROC | 10 | 7 | 62.04 | 61.90 | 62.34 | 61.83 | 4:08.11 |
| 10 | Beierl / Onasanya | AUT | 16 | 18 | 61.91 | 62.12 | 61.89 | 62.32 | 4:08.24 |
| 11 | Huai / Wang | CHN | 1 | 12 | 61.88 | 62.17 | 62.11 | 62.10 | 4:08.26 |
| 12 | Lotholz / Villani | CAN | 12 | 15 | 62.12 | 62.09 | 61.85 | 62.31 | 4:08.37 |
| 13 | Boch / Senechal | FRA | 3 | 27 | 61.90 | 62.32 | 62.20 | 61.97 | 4:08.39 |
| 14 | Ying / Du | CHN | 15 | 8 | 61.92 | 62.19 | 62.29 | 62.09 | 4:08.49 |
| 15 | Vannieuwenhuyse / Aerts | BEL | 20 | 25 | 62.08 | 62.12 | 62.11 | 62.27 | 4:08.58 |
| 16 | Walker / Reddingus | AUS | 19 | 24 | 61.98 | 62.11 | 62.04 | 62.51 | 4:08.64 |
| 17 | McNeill / Douglas | GBR | 18 | 20 | 62.19 | 62.35 | 62.17 | 62.14 | 4:08.85 |
| 18 | Grecu / Wick | ROU | 14 | 10 | 61.82 | 62.47 | 62.25 | 62.44 | 4:08.98 |
| 19 | Makarova / Mamedova | ROC | 2 | 9 | 61.83 | 62.29 | 62.48 | 62.49 | 4:09.09 |
| 20 | Fontanive / Strebel | SUI | 17 | 17 | 62.48 | 62.35 | 62.35 | 62.41 | 4:09.59 |
