Novouralsk (ck) - A thriller until the last luger was in the finish and then a surprising result – this was the first day of the 24th European Championships. For the first time the constantly growing Russian team managed to win a gold medal in a team, event. The team in the constellation with Juri Talikh, Ekatharina Lavrentjeva and the double Pavel Porshnev/Ivan Lazarev competed for the first time in Umhausen in the 2011 World Championships where they had to settle for bronze. That they claimed the top spot on the podium in their home race makes them especially happy and proud. “It was difficult to win here. We have worked really hard for that. it is a success of the whole team and all our coaches”, said Ivan Lazarev. Ekatharina Lavrentjeva analyzes the race: “Today we all performed well. At the word championships we were not as stable as we are now. When everybody can deliver his best, than it is a great success and today we achieved this.” Austria had an excellent jumpstart into the championships, with the second place for team Austria II and the third place for team Austria I. The relief which “interimistic sport director” as he calls himself, Gerhard Kleinhofer, felt, was obvious: “It is fantastic to start into a championship with two medals in the pocket. This success was not to be expected, but maybe it is the reward for all the hard work we have done in the past weeks and months. We have had a tough season with out sport director Hansjörg Schneebauer having heart surgery. He was in the hospital until a short time ago and we want to send him our best wishes on that way.” The success was indeed a surprise even for some of the athletes: “I touched the boards three times, the track was slippery and my set up was certainly not ideal for the conditions”, said Tina Unterberger (AUT II) who with this silver medal celebrates the biggest success in her career. She has earned her spot in the team with a constantly good performance throughout the season. The pressure to be the decider in this race was handled very well by Christian Schatz/Gerhard Mühlbacher (AUT II): “It was a great feeling to know that we would have the run which decided the race. It was a great start into the championships”, said Mühlbacher. They had made some last moment changes at their equipment to be up to speed in the dry cold at the Urals: “We changed pretty much everything last night and obviously we did the right thing.” So far in the lead with equipment experiments is Thomas Schopf, who achieved the fastest run time of the day: “I am glad that I could give my best for the team. I am using runners which we produce ourselves with our own steal. I already used it two years ago here and it worked well, so I made a few minor changes and now it runs even better”, he said. No hopes for the bronze medal had the team of Austria I with Michael Scheikl, Melanie Batkowski and Christian Schopf/Andreas Schopf: “Pigneter/Clara had to become fourth in their run, not more. We had no doubt that they would easily accomplish this. That even Patrick makes mistakes, was a real surprise”, said Scheikl. The final ranking goes by points for the respective rank, not by the total time. This is why Austria II with 73 points and a total time of 3:06,28 could beat Austria I with 68 points and a total time of 3:05,01. The European Championships will be continued tomorrow, Saturday, with the two doubles’ runs and the first runs for men and women. Final Results Team Event: 1. Russia I 3:03,71 83 Ekatharina LAVRENTJEVA, 1:00,28(1) 30 Juri TALIKH, 1:00,09(3) 23 Pavel PORSHNEV/Ivan LAZAREV, 1:03,34(1) 30 2. Austria II 3:06,28 73 Tina UNTERBERGER, 1:03,15(6) 17 Thomas SCHOPF, 0:59,66(1) 30 Christian SCHATZ/Gerhard MÜHLBACHER,1:03,47(2) 26 3. Austria I 3:05,01 68 Melanie BATKOWSKI, 1:01,23(2) 26 Michael SCHEIKL,1:00,26(5) 19 Christian SCHOPF/Andreas SCHOPF, 1:03,52(3) 23 4. Italy I 3:07,72 66 Renate GIETL, 1:01,92(3) 23 Anton BLASBICHLER, 0:59,97(2) 26 Patrick PIGNETER/Florian CLARA, 1:05,83(6) 17 5. Italy II 3,09,75 55 Melanie SCHWARZ, 1:02,27(4) 21 Alex GRUBER, 1:00,25(4) 21 Hannes CLARA/Stefan GRUBER, 1:07,23(8) 13 6. Russia II 3:09,70 51 Ludmila AKSENENKO, 1:02,93(5) 19 Stanislav KOVSHIK, 1:00,40(6) 17 Aleksandr EGOROV/Petr POPOV, 1:06,37(7) 15 7. Germany 3:09,09 49 Veronika NACHMANN, Marcus GRAUSAM, Björn KIERSPEL/Christian WICHAN 8. Poland/Slovenia 3:10,48 47 Petra DRAGICEVIC, Adam JEDRZEJKO, Andrej LASZCZAK/Damian WANICZEK 9. Turkey/Ukraine 3:38,56 36 Asuman BAYRAK, Isa GUEZELOGLU, Marian HUZNER/Andrii TOLOPKO Program of the Remaining Days of the European Championships: Saturday, 18.02.2012: 10.00am: 1st competition run doubles 10.30am: 1st competition run women 11.30am: 2nd competition run doubles afterwards Flower ceremony doubles 1.00pm: 1st competition run men Sunday, 19.02.2012: 10.00am: 2nd competition run women 10.30am: 2nd competition run men 11.30am: 3rd competition run women 12.00pm: 3rd competition run men afterwards Flower Ceremony women and men 3.00pm: Medal Ceremonies and Closing Ceremony