WWe’re watching because we don’t know how it will end. This is a daring thesis with a view to the lugers in the Olympic ice track. Numbers anyone? There have been 52 competitions since the Olympic premiere in 1964. German athletes had won 37 by Thursday, and the women have not been defeated at the Olympics since 1998 (Silke Kraushaar). Then came the relay competition in China, and finally the German gold race with three Olympic champions at the start.
First the fastest woman in the team, Natalie Geisenberger, then the best man, Johannes Ludwig, and finally the doubles Tobias Wendl/Tobias Arlt, 24 hours after their victory: three times gold led to gold, which everyone was expecting. Just not the architect. Norbert Loch, the head coach, highly decorated with everything you can win in your job. His first reaction to the 100% gold return in four out of four competitions: “Relief.”
There are two reasons for this. Here’s the first: Loch’s relief indicated the opposite of what the first three luge competitions on the Yanqing track conveyed with the German victory record as a prognosis: an easy, inevitable victory for the luge nation of all nations. What did the Austrians informally promise the German camp the day before the final? “We’ll beat you.” That wasn’t a touch of megalomania.
Just as Loch’s wise skepticism always seems justified. The neighbors are world class. Madeleine Egle, in the individual competition, only touched her nerves in the wild 13, the selective passage. Not this time. She, the co-favorite who fell in the singles, advanced, followed by the top lugers Wolfgang Kindl and the doubles Thomas Steu/Lorenz Koller. A lightning-fast squadron, with fast reaction times once the target sign was posted and the start at the top cleared. A grandiose express train, a tremendous artwork.
The super luger Geisenberger could not quite follow: 0.083 seconds behind before Ludwig took over. Clean on the track, no mistakes to be seen with the naked eye, the gap melted to nine thousandths of a second. So far is measured whether the tiny differences among the best. But the Olympic champion lost time to the finish: 0.083 seconds behind. Actually too much at this level. Then the doubles from Berchtesgaden catapulted into the track, inspired by the third Olympic triumph in a row on Wednesday, by the good material under the buttocks.
“That’s the icing on the cake”
“The Tobiasse,” said the national coach to ZDF, “rocked the team competition.” It was an exciting little dance in the last few meters when the sled turned slightly because pilot Wendl had to sit up at full speed to hit the stop sign and stop time. Before that, the course showed what it was all about: nuances in catching up. They took 0.083 seconds down on the track.