Artificial track luge:

GOLD! Egle & Kipp crowned world champions

Selina Egle and Lara Kipp are world champions!

(Bild: AP/ASSOCIATED PRESS)

The World Cup series winners Selina Egle and Lara Kipp have also lived up to their own role as favorites at the World Artificial Track Luge Championships in Whistler. Thanks to a strong first run, the two Tyroleans won the doubles' event on Saturday by a wafer-thin margin ahead of the German duos Jessica Degenhardt/Cheyenne Rosenthal (+0.029 seconds) and Dajana Eitberger/Magdalena Matschina (+0.060) and successfully defended their title

In the men's competition, Thomas Steu and Wolfgang Kindl narrowly missed out on a medal after finishing third at the halfway stage (+0.156). The gold medal went to the Germans Hannes Orlamünder/Paul Gubitz ahead of the Latvians Martins Bots/Roberts Plume (+0.102) and their compatriots and record Olympic champions Tobias Wendl/Tobias Arlt (+0.133). Yannick Müller/Armin Frauscher in sixth and Juri Gatt/Riccardo Schöpf in ninth were not satisfied, they were already in these places after the first run. In the women's single Madeleine Egle was the best Austrian in seventh place.

"A madness, crazy"
Egle/Kipp had already won gold in the mixed doubles with Steu/Kindl on Thursday and went one better. "Gold yesterday, gold today and gold again tomorrow, I would say," said Egle, referring to the team relay scheduled for the next day. The doubles' decision could hardly have been more exciting. Egle/Kipp were still behind at the last intermediate time, but turned things around in the final meters. "It's unbelievable, amazing, crazy that we are world champions for the second time," said Egle.

Including the World Cup, they won their seventh double-seater race in a row. Nevertheless, the success was not necessarily expected from their own side. "After a mixed week of training, we hadn't expected a run like this," said a "mega happy" Egle. According to Kipp, there had been alternating good and not-so-good runs in training. "We were afraid that there might be another not-so-good one in the race. Thank goodness it wasn't like that," Kipp summed up.

The mixed performance the day before was an important factor. "Yesterday we showed that we can actually do it well, which gave us confidence. And then today we delivered twice," said Kipp. The ÖRV duo had set a new track record in heat one in 38.858 seconds, which was improved once again by Degenhardt/Rosenthal (38.806).

No ÖRV medal in the women's single
Germany's Julia Taubitz took the title in the single-seater ahead of her compatriot Merle Fräbel and Emily Sweeney from the USA. Madeleine Egle, who had won bronze in the mixed single with David Gleirscher on Friday, had to settle for seventh place, defending champion Lisa Schulte finished twelfth and Hannah Prock 14th.

Austria already has four medals. On Thursday, Madeleine Egle and David Gleirscher also won bronze in the mixed singles. The decisions in the men's single and the team relay will follow on Saturday.