For the first day of training our hopes of sliding on hard cold ice were literally washed away as the weather in Unterammergau took a turn for the worse and poured rain all day. This caused the ice on the track to be very soft which resulted in slower speeds for the whole field. Knowing that Unterammergau is notoriously a very speedy track we were disappointed that we would not experience the full speeds on our first day of training. The highlight of the day was hitting the brakes in the finish area (which resembled a swimming pool) and having a tidal wave slow you to a soaking halt! Another training note: Greg and Kaj for the second time entered a World Cup race as a doubles team. The slushy conditions also made for a very wet, cold, and exhilarating doubles training run.
Saturday’s program featured the doubles race. Greg and Kaj had a very busy day with three doubles runs. They were feeling more and more confident with each run and claimed two personal victories. They were faster with every consecutive run and their two race runs were within three tenths of one another. Greg and Kaj are looking forward to more doubles training and racing and to learning more about the technique of doubles sliding.Sunday was the main event: the Men’s Singles race. This week, the full crew of John Gibson, Greg Jones, and Kaj Johnson were entered to represent Canada. The day’s conditions were the first victory of the day; the temperatures were low and the ice was hard and fast. Unfortunately, John woke up feeling flu-like symptoms but pulled himself together enough to start in the race.
All three of us had our fastest runs on the track in our first race runs, something that we are always striving for. This had John placed in 21st, Greg in 20th, and Kaj in 14th position for the start of the second run. John was first up for the Canadians and had a slightly slower second run but maintained his 21st position. Greg was very consistent coming in only three tenths slower than his first run and moved into 19th position. Kaj was one of the few athletes in the field to have a faster second run than his first, which helped to propel him into 13th position in the final results. In the end, this race held many victories for the small Canadian contingent. For starters, both Greg and Kaj had their best ever World Cup finishes. 
Secondly, Kaj’s start time for the second race run was the fastest in the whole field. And lastly, the fastest nation after the Italian and Austrian powerhouses was Canada. Astonishingly, these results were accomplished with no prior training on this track.We leave Germany on an intense high. The next World Cup is in Deutchenhofen, Italy next weekend. We are hoping that this high will carry us to similar results there.
All for now,
The Canadian Natural Luge Team
This is fantastic Bill and when I see you I am going to give you a big hug. The Canadian Natural Luge world has been needing something like this for a long time (in the way of promotional support). As you know many of us are too busy dong the track work, etc. to manage to put something like this up. THANK YOU so much for your time, effort, caring, love of the sport and the regard for the hard working group that make luge a success for those that love the exhilaration (including you)! It is so nice to see my children's and my "kid's" (all my luge kids -love MOM) accomplishments from a Canadian source on a site that is easy for us to follow. I have sent the address to many people already so they can check on how their brother, cousin, grandchild and friend is doing.
ReplyDeleteThank you also to Chris Karl for going the distance for us, the photographer that does such a fine job and to the World Cup sponsor, Sobe.
Thank you Smitty's Hinton for sponsoring my son. I am sure you do know how much it means.
Way to go Kaj, John and Greg! We love you.