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Ten months after the World Championships, Kaillie Humphries and Francesco Friedrich still dominate the races hosted on the Altenberg track, in the third round of the Bobsleigh World Cup.
Sunday 5 December 2021 10 minutes reading time
In the women's field, the great protagonist was undoubtedly the two-time Olympic champion who gave herself a double success to better celebrate her awaited US citizenship, a document that will allow her to be at the start of the Beijing 2022 Olympic Games competing for the first time for the United States.
Humphries in fact, after having reported abuses within the Canadian team (his country of origin), in the last four years he left Canada and was welcomed by the American team for which he also took part in the last world championships, but to be at the start of the Olympic Games, the Calgary athlete would have had to officially obtain a US passport. A not insignificant bureaucratic quibble, considering the stringent regulations in terms of nationalization by the United States that Humphries herself had denounced in the main American newspapers last summer.
Battle that the North American champion managed to win by appealing to the Governor of California, the official residence of the hobbyist and her husband Travis Armbruster, who last Thursday expressed a favorable opinion giving Humphries the long-awaited American citizenship.
Arriving in Altenberg with just one training session, after flying 17 hours directly from San Francisco, the 36-year-old from Calgary immediately set the record straight, winning the World Series monobob race on Saturday, mocking her former brakeman by just 6 cents. and national teammate Cynthia Appiah and the German Laura Nolte, and then today she gave herself an encore by always winning the first seasonal success in the two-man bobsleigh.
The four-time world champion, accompanied in the race by brakeman Kaysha Love, made the difference in the last stretch of the final heat, where she was decidedly cleaner than the German Nolte who drove after the first lap, overcoming the Teutonic by just 4 cents. A fairytale weekend for Humphries who in Altenberg thus obtained his 28th career seal in the World Cup, the fifth on the demanding track in Saxony.
Third place 35 cents from the top for Canadian Christine de Bruin, now a constant presence in the top positions of the standings, who in the second run overtook Kim Kalicki who recovered promptly after the reversal remedied the previous day in the monobob. The topfive is completed by the other American Elana Meyers-Taylor who confirms that she does not have a great feeling with the German track, the same one that at the World Championships had seen her protagonist of a double reversal in the first world edition of the monobob. Weekend to forget for the Olympic champion Mariama Jamanka tenth in two and thirteenth in mono.
Reversals that also had as protagonist the blue Giada Andreutti, overturned at turn 9 during the first heat of the monobob and then subsequently overturned together with Tania Vicenzino exiting the kreisel in the final heat of the two-man bobsleigh. Fortunately, both athletes did not suffer physical damage, but once again the Saxon gut proved extremely difficult to the two Friulians who had already knocked them out after two descents at the 2020 World Championships. From this difficult weekend, the positive note for the Italian colors is represented by the good second descent of Andreutti's monobob who printed an interesting 11th time ahead of even the Olympic champion Jamanka.
Among men the undisputed dominion of Francesco Friedrich continues. The champion from Pirna has once again hit the double bobsleigh bobsleigh and bobsled four bringing the streak of consecutive victories in both bobsleigh disciplines to 7. struggling more than usual to bend the competition since in the first round they made a series of mistakes that put them in provisional third place. In the decisive round, however, the Teutonic association had no rivals, recovering all the gap accumulated previously and winning the 40th success in the two-man bobsleigh for Friedrich.
Second position at 24 cents from the leader, for Johannes Lochner who by only 3 cents managed to contain the attempt to overtake by the always competitive Rostislav Gaitiukevich. Fourth place for Spring, fifth a positive Hafer, while an excellent performance for the blues Patrick Baumgartner and Robert Mircea who, aboard a Belgian bob, hit 13th position, signing the ninth absolute time in the second heat. A good sign for the South Tyrolean driver after a decidedly subdued start of the season. Baumgartner then, together with Eric Fantazzini, Alex Verginer and Lorenzo Bilotti, conquered an encouraging 14th place in the four-man bobsleigh, concluding a weekend of races that makes us hope for the next appointments given that there is still a long way to go. to hit the Olympic qualification. However, Mattia Variola did not compete. During training he overturned with the four-man bobsleigh and the blue technical staff preferred to save the Pordenone driver for the next competitive engagements.
In the four-man bob Francesco Friedrich had no rivals, trimming almost 7 tenths to the excellent Benjamin Maier and 80 cents to the Russian Gaitiukevich. An embarrassing domination for the phenomenon of the German bobsleigh who has won 58 times in the World Cup in his career and who in Beijing 2022 will aim to further enter the history of bobsleighs trying to get the back to back in the bobsleigh and bobsleigh, operation never before done by any pilot.
Lochner completes the topfive, good at recovering from ninth to fourth place, and Kripps last driver in the race to contain the gap to under the second from Friedrich.
The next appointment with the Bobsleigh World Cup is scheduled in 7 days on the Winterberg gut, will it always be Friedrich monologue?
#HUMPRIES #FRIEDRICH #BAUMGARTNER #BOBITALIA
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