4 months ago
USA Luge’s Summer Britcher is flying into nan Olympics.
Britcher sewage her 2nd women’s singles luge triumph of nan play connected Sunday, moving her atop nan World Cup standings and further cementing her position arsenic a badge contender for nan Milan Cortina Olympics adjacent month.
She prevailed successful Sigulda, Latvia, rallying successful nan 2nd power to apical Lisa Schulte of Austria and Julia Taubitz of Germany. Britcher’s two-run clip was 1 minute, 23.840 seconds, while Schulte vanished successful 1:23.877 and Taubitz successful 1:23.931.
It was Britcher’s seventh profession singles win, extending her all-time grounds for USA Luge sliders.
“Very, very happy,” Britcher said aft her 3rd badge – 2 golds and a bronze – successful 3 singles races this season. “I’ve had a batch of ups and downs present successful Sigulda, but a agelong clip agone it was for illustration my favourite way and I really loved it. ... It was a batch of nosy to consciousness that joyousness again connected nan way here.”
Britcher has a chance to go nan first American to triumph a World Cup wide singles crown. USA Luge has had 4 World Cup season-long champions – each successful men’s doubles. Chris Thorpe and Gordy Sheer were nan first and past Mark Grimmette and Brian Martin did it 3 times, nan past of those coming successful 2002-03.
And – somewhat remarkably – Britcher leads nan points standings contempt missing a race. USA Luge skipped nan season-opening World Cup title successful Winterberg, Germany, because it wasn’t factoring into nan Olympic qualifying formula.
Britcher was 3rd going into Sunday’s 2nd heat; nan singles races astatine Sigulda this play utilized nan two-runs-over-two-days format, a spot of mentation for nan two-day, four-run arena astatine nan Olympics.
Schulte and Taubitz were nan only sliders who had a chance to drawback Britcher astatine nan end. They came up short, which evidently caught Britcher by a spot of surprise.
“I really did not deliberation it was going to happen,” Britcher said. “I tried really difficult to not deliberation astir nan results. With nan 1 tally each day, you person truthful overmuch clip to deliberation astir possibilities, truthful I really was conscionable reasoning about, ‘OK, what do I request to do connected nan track?’ So, I deliberation possibly I had a small anticlimactic grin astatine nan end. I was truthful shocked.”
Ashley Farquharson was 5th for nan US successful nan women’s singles race. Emily Fischnaller, who was 4th entering nan 2nd heat, mislaid power toward nan bottommost of nan way and came disconnected her sled. She did not decorativeness – but walked disconnected appearing to person avoided injury.
Britcher and Farquharson look good connected their measurement to general nominations to nan Olympic squad by USA Luge. There are still aggregate paths for Fischnaller to return to nan Olympics arsenic well; adjacent weekend’s World Cup extremity successful Winterberg, Germany, apt will determine nan fates for respective sliders from galore countries, including Fischnaller and US men’s singles seasoned Tucker West.
The Winterberg races are nan past Olympic qualifying races of nan season.
The women’s singles triumph was 1 of 2 medals connected nan time for Britcher, who besides helped USA Luge seizure nan bronze successful nan squad relay.
Schulte and Austria won nan squad relay, pinch big Latvia 2nd and nan American squad of Britcher, Jonny Gustafson successful men’s singles, Zach DiGregorio and Sean Hollander connected nan men’s doubles sled and Chevonne Forgan and Sophia Kirkby connected nan women’s doubles sled finishing third.
In nan men’s singles race, two-time Olympic singles champion Felix Loch of Germany sewage his 55th profession triumph – 2 distant from nan all-time grounds of 57 held by retired Italian awesome Armin Zöggeler. Jonas Müller of Austria was 2nd and Max Langenhan of Germany was third.
USA Luge plans to denote its Olympic squad astir 12 January, and nan US bobsled and skeleton teams for nan Milan Cortina Games are expected to beryllium unveiled connected 19 January.
At Winterberg, nan big Germans swept a women’s bobsled title Sunday while Kaillie Humphries Armbruster of nan US narrowly missed a badge spot.
Laura Nolte drove to nan triumph for Germany, holding disconnected teammates Lisa Buckwitz and Kim Kalicki. Nolte’s two-run clip was 1:53.63, which was 0.16 seconds amended than Buckwitz and 0.66 seconds up of Kalicki.
Humphries Armbruster teamed pinch Sylvia Hoffman to decorativeness fourth, 0.95 seconds backmost of Nolte. Elana Meyers Taylor drove to eighth spot for nan US, and Kaysha Love crossed nan statement 10th.
And successful nan four-man title later Sunday, nan play of absolute power for Germany continued.
Francesco Friedrich drove to nan win, Johannes Lochner was 2nd and Adam Ammour rallied successful nan 2nd power to decorativeness third, giving Germany its eighth expanse successful 10 World Cup two- and four-man races this season.
Those 3 sleds were separated by a specified 0.06 seconds.
The Germans now person 28 World Cup medals this play successful men’s bobsled. The remainder of nan world mixed has 2 – a bronze for South Korea and a bronze for Italy.
Kris Horn drove to an eighth-place decorativeness for nan US successful nan four-man race, while Frank Del Duca’s sled vanished 16th.
