Friedrich wins 9th 2-man world bobsleigh title, leading another German sweep
Canada's Cynthia Appiah finish 4th in women's monobob, Kaysha Love of the U.S. takes title
The greatest ever just keeps getting better.
Francesco Friedrich is a world champion again, winning the two-man race at Mount Van Hoevenberg on Sunday in a down-to-the-wire finish — holding off German teammate Johannes Lochner by the razor-slim margin of 0.03 seconds over four runs encompassing about four miles of ice.
"It was a tough battle," Friedrich said. "We said it would be."
It's the ninth two-man world championship of Friedrich's career and extended his record total to 15 world titles overall, when adding in his six crowns in four-man. He'll look to add another four-man title when worlds conclude in Lake Placid next week.
That total doesn't even take into account his four Olympic gold medals — two-man and four-man sweeps at the 2018 and 2022 Games. When it comes to the biggest races, nobody has won more than Friedrich. Not even close. And for this title, he had to make up some ground in the final turns.
"Having the motivation to win every race is no problem for me," Friedrich said.
WATCH | Friedrich wins 9th 2-man world title in dramatic fashion:
Friedrich and Alexander Schuller finished their four runs over two days in three minutes, 39.32 seconds. Lochner and Georg Fleischhauer finished in 3:39.35, and Adam Ammour and Benedikt Hertel finished the German medal sweep in 3:40.15.
It's the fourth time in the last five years that Germany has swept the medals in the season's biggest two-man race, this one being added to the sweeps at worlds in 2021, the 2022 Beijing Olympics and last year's world championships.
Frank Del Duca and Charlie Volker were fourth for the U.S. in 3:40.38, missing a medal by less than a quarter-second. And after it was over, Del Duca tipped his cap to Friedrich's continued dominance.
"He knows how to communicate with a sled," Del Duca said. "He knows when he needs to steer a little more. He knows when to just let it run. And sometimes he's flat-out flawless. He just knows how to get speed out of the sled. And he and the guys around him are incredible athletes. They always find a way to get it done."
Leuders's track record falls
Friedrich was first down the mountain Sunday and set the tone by completing Run 3 in 54.60 seconds, a track record — shaving 0.01 seconds off the mark that Pierre Lueders of Canada set 22 years ago.
And Friedrich held the record for about two minutes. Lochner got down in 54.52 seconds, cutting Friedrich's overall lead going into the final heat to 0.06 seconds.
The start order is reversed for the final run so Lochner went next-to-last, one sled before Friedrich, and finished in 54.94 seconds. That meant Friedrich needed a 55.00 to tie; he crossed the line in 54.97.
Lochner's split times in the final run put him ahead of Friedrich with about three turns left, before Friedrich made up the deficit in the final 100 meters or so of the track.
Friedrich got five wins in the World Cup season and Lochner won four times. There are only eight races — the German stars actually tied for the win in one of those events, and through 20 competitive two-man runs this season Friedrich's two-man sled finished a mere 1.13 seconds faster than Lochner's.
They were close all season, and close again in the season's two-man finale.
"It was an amazing race," Lochner said.
Taylor Austin and Mike Evelyn O'Higgins were the top Canadians, finishing 15th (3:43.63). Pat Norton and Shaq Murray-Lawrence were 16th, while Cyrus Gray and Kenny-Luketa M'Pindou placed 26th.
Women's monobob
Barely two years ago, Kaysha Love was finishing somewhere around last place in what would best be described as minor bobsleigh races.
She's now the world monobob champion.
WATCH | American Kaysha Love lands worlds monobob gold on home soil:
Love's meteoric rise to the top of her sport is now complete, after finishing off a victory in the women's monobob — meaning just one person in the sled — world title race at Mount Van Hoevenberg on Sunday. It was the second gold for USA Bobsled and Skeleton so far at the world championships, after victory in the mixed team skeleton race on Saturday.
Love's four-run time over two days was 3 minutes, 57.82 seconds. Laura Nolte of Germany, the 2023 and 2024 world monobob champion, was second in 3:58.26, and Elana Meyers Taylor of the U.S. was third in 3:58.31.
"So close," Meyers Taylor said as she embraced Nolte at the finish.
Toronto's Cynthia Appiah finished just off the podium, placing fourth in 3:58.53.
"This result is bittersweet. I was hoping to get on the podium because Lake Placid is a track I've done so well in the monobob. This is the track where I first got introduced to the sport as a brakeman and where I also learned to drive," said Appiah, who was competing in her fourth world championships as a pilot. "I was hoping to have a nice Cinderella story at these Worlds. All things considered though this is my best finish at world championships, so I have to be happy."
Kristen Bujnowski of Mount Brydges, Ont., was seventh (3:58.77) and Melissa Lotholz of Barrhead, Alta., came 14th (4:00.42).
WATCH | Canada's Cynthia Appiah finishes just outside the monobob medals at worlds:
Love becomes the seventh pilot to win a world championship for the United States, joining Stanley Benham, Lloyd Johnson, Arthur Tyler, Steven Holcomb, Meyers Taylor and Kaillie Humphries.
The 27-year-old Love sprinted in college at UNLV and grew up with dreams of making the Olympics in gymnastics before turning her attention to track. She got to the Olympics three years ago as a bobsleigh push athlete — and now might have earned a spot as one of the faces of Team USA going into next winter's Milan-Cortina Games.
Sunday's gold is her second world championships medal, joining a bronze that she won pushing Humphries' two-woman sled just two years ago at St. Moritz. That was around the time when Love began the switch from the back to the front of the sled and started the process of learning how to drive.
The early returns were awful. Fortunately, she ignored those results.
Love drove in six races during the 2022-23 season on the North American Cup tour, a mostly developmental circuit where hopefuls tend to learn if they can drive or not. She was last or next-to-last among the finishers of every race, finishing an average of 2.51 seconds behind the winning sled. That's not close. That's a lifetime in sliding.
A few months later, something just clicked. She was winning development races the following fall, got onto the World Cup circuit for the first time and — in something that rarely happens — won her debut monobob race.
That was only 15 months ago. She's now the world champion, not to mention a serious Olympic contender for next winter regardless of whether the races are in the Italian Alps or back in Lake Placid.
Love was the leader after Saturday's first two runs and had a third-run time Sunday afternoon of 59.49 seconds. That was a bit slower than the third-run times for both Nolte (59.41) and Meyers Taylor (59.46), but Love's margin after Saturday was enough to ensure that she would hang onto the lead.
Her lead over Nolte was 0.17 seconds going into the final run. It was enough of a cushion.
With files from CBC Sports