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Felix Loch returns to smile after almost a year full of bitter disappointments and returns to do so in the most important event of the season in Winterberg during the World Championships in sledging.
Monday 28 January 2019 11 minutes reading time
The Teutonic champion dominator last season after the incredible fifth place of Pyeongchang 2018 was no longer able to express himself as he had accustomed us in previous years, collecting this winter only two podiums in the 9 World Cup races played so far.
With these premises Loch certainly did not start with the prediction last weekend in the 48th edition of the World Championships in sledging. Instead, the two-time Olympic champion showed up at the start of the most important event of the season, more aggressive than ever, making clear from the sprint race on Friday closed to second place behind the amazing Austrian Jonas Muller, to be ready to recover the world champion's scepter. And so it was.
Loch in the traditional test, that disputed on two descents, has practically had no rivals, disputing a wonderful first descent in which he printed by far the best part of the day and then in the final round he managed the accumulated advantage by crossing the finish line with 100 thousandths. of margin on the reassembling Reinhard Egger.
The champion native of Sonneberg but in all respects Bavarian, has thus reached a quota of 6 titles the 'blue Armin Zoeggeler becoming together with the legendary athlete of Foiana the most titled toboggan in the history of the World Championships. To be honest, the German with this success has overtaken the Italian champion in the total calculation of the world gold medals won in individual sled races. In fact, Loch boasts a world title sprint obtained in 2016 in Koenigssee which, added to the 6 victories in the traditional format, lead him alone to the top of the list of the most winning sledging ever in the world events.
More than a victory, it was a genuine release for Loch, who at the end of the race was overwhelmed by hugs from his teammates and by his father Norbert, the great leader of the German sled. A success that now could shift the balance even in the World Cup, since the Bavarian phenomenon is in third place in the overall standings but that will find in its calendar three stages (Altenberg, Oberhof and Sochi ed) for a total of 4 races very favorable to its technical characteristics.
Behind Loch, Austria is celebrating with a very good Reinhard Egger to seize his first world championship medal with a second superlative heat that has been traced back from fifth to second place. Third place and bronze medal for the Russian Semen Pavlichenko detached just 13 thousandths from the place of honor, who returns home from the Winterberg weekend with two individual bronzes at work, having placed third in the sprint race.
Double wood medal for the leader of the general classification Johannes Ludwig, fourth in both competitions in the program, only sixth the Russian Roman Repilov who consoles himself with the title reserved for the Under23, while only seventh placed the best of the Blues Dominik Fischnaller unlike his cousin Kevin, it was never the fight for a precious metal. Just the "less" famous of the two Fischnaller risked to blow up the bench at Winterberg closing the first descent in third overall position. Then in the final heat the twenty-five of Maranza has thwarted everything by making a clear error in entry to the last corner falling from third to tenth place. The two blues have not stolen the eye even in the sprint where respectively ninth Kevin and eleventh Dominik arrived.
Among the women, Natalie Geisenberger celebrated a double world championship success, climbing to 5 individual world titles. The two times Olympic champion has beaten in both the races scheduled the young compatriot Julia Taubitz very good to confirm at the top even in the world championship. Geisenberger won the first world title sprint career with just 7 thousandths on Taubitz and 40 on Dajana Eitberger that allowed Germany to monopolize the 'entire podium.
In the traditional test the almost thirty-one of Berchtesgaden has literally killed the competition by taking 423 thousandths of Julia Taubitz, the new world champion Under23, and 513 thousandths of the American Emily Sweeney up from fourth position. The topfive closes with the Russian Ivanova fourth and the American Summer Britcher fifth, who lost two placements in the final heat. In Casa Italia there are two good positions among the ten with Andrea Voetter seventh and Sandra Robatscher ninth. The two blue ones did not steal the eye in the sprint where Voetter was twelfth mantre Robatscher was disqualified for irregular materials.
Big disappointment of this world champion the Huefner and Eitberger with the first that did not take any medal closing the fifth sprint and tenth the race on two heats, while Eitberger after the bronze in the sprint came only twelfth in the traditional format.
In the two-seater sled, double title for the Germans Toni Eggert and Sascha Benecken who in both races have preceded on the podium the "acerrimi" rivals Wendl-Artl and Steu-Koller. If in the format that started the Thuringian duo won with wide merit, the title in the trial with two heats arrived mainly due to a smear committed by Wendl-Artl during the last descent. The Bavarian duo in fact had closed the first heat in command with 39 thousandths on Eggert-Benecken, but in the final round he committed some smudging too close with the fifth time and losing the gold medal for just 78 thousandths.
The Italy of doubles gets a sixth place with Rieder-Rastner, a thirteenth with the very young Nagler-Malleier good to print the third time of the heats in the final heat and a sixteenth place with Rieder-Kainzwaldner.
Great surprise in the team test with Russia for the first time in history gets the world title. The team composed of Tatyana Ivanova, Semen Pavlichenko and Yuzhakov-Prokhorov literally dominated the race by making the gap with the second and third fractions, closing with over half a second ahead of Austria and Germany. The latter after 19 years of consecutive successes had to abdicate despite an excellent first fraction of Geisenberger.
Italy despite the German counter-performance failed to get on the podium closing in fourth place. Thus closes an iridescent edition of avar satisfaction for the blue colors. The Italian team returns from Winterberg without any medal, a situation that was not repeated by the Whistler World Championships in 2013.
Filed the world championships it is already time to think about the World Cup. The next weekend in Altenberg starts with the seventh round of the season, will arrive in Saxony the first success in the Cup of Felix Loch?
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