Double premiere for Thomas Steu and his new partner Wolfgang Kindl

Innsbruck (FIL/13 Jan 2024) Premiere for Thomas Steu and Wolfgang Kindl. At the EBERSPAECHER Luge World Cup in Innsbruck-Igls, the newly formed Austrian team won together for the first time. It was the eleventh World Cup victory for Steu and Kindl. Steu achieved the first ten with his retired partner Lorenz Koller, while Kindl's statistics include ten victories in men's singles events. He also won gold at the European Championships. "This is my first title, it's huge," said the 29-year-old Steu. His list of achievements includes two titles in the team competition. Looking at his partner Kindl, he says: "Johnny already has a couple of titles." They date back to 2017, when the 35-year-old became World Champion in both the sprint and individual events on the Olympic track in Igls. And in 2022 he won gold at the European Championships in St. Moritz.

Steu/Kindl have also improved their track record. It now stands at 39.344 seconds. The old record holders were Steu/Koller. Their time (39.346) was still well below the old record (39.387). Their combined time was 1:18.690 minutes.

The second Austrian double Juri Gatt/Riccardo Schöpf had bad luck. After the first run they were second, but in the final run they had problems in the labyrinth and entered the finishing curve too early. The result: a crash. They finished ninth, 0.896 seconds behind. "We feel sorry for Juri and Riccardo," said Kindl, "we are friends within the team, but the rivalry within our own team drives us on and that's why we are where we are today.

The fastest starters Martins Bots and Roberts Plume (Latvia) in second place (+0.172) and on third Tobias Wendl/Tobias Arlt (Germany/+0.296) benefited from this. To everyone's amazement, six-time Olympic and six-time World Champion Tobias Wendl said: "This is our best result at the World Cup in Igls for many years. We've never been on the podium here at the EBERSPÄCHER World Cup." In fact, the last time the two Tobis finished second at the World Cup, which was supported by a different title sponsor at the time, was in 2019."

The U23 men's title was won by Juri Gatt and Riccardo Schöpf with a total time of 1:19.586 minutes despite a crash - they had slid through the finish line lying on their sides with their sleds still attached. The Latvians Raimonds Baltgalvis/Vitalijs Jegorovs (+0.070 back) finished second ahead of Moritz Jäger/Valentin Steudte (+0.073 / Germany).

As in the men's race, two Austrians were unlucky in the women's race. The two Tyroleans Selina Egle and Lara Kipp were leading after the first run, but in the second run they made a big mistake coming out of curve nine. At the end they finished ninth in the World Cup standings and this was only third in the U23 European Championships. The U23 victory went to Latvia's Robezniece/Bogdanova, the young local heroes Lisa Zimmermann and Dorothea Schwarz were second.

Jessica Degenhardt and Cheyenne Rosenthal surprised everyone. With a brilliant second run and a final time of 1:20.178 minutes, the two Germans improved from third to first place. The 2023 European Champions Andrea Vötter and Marion Oberhofer (ITA) finished second in both runs. In total, only 14 thousandths of a second separated the two fastest starters in both runs from defending their title. Marion Oberhofer was surprised: "We thought we would be second, we expected Selina and Lara to be next to us. Now it was Jessi and Cheyenne. We didn't really expect them.

Third place went to the Americans Chevonne Forgan and Sophia Kirkby (0.206 seconds back). "It's fantastic," said a delighted Forgan, "we like Igls and the fact that we were able to finish on the podium today is incredible. Latvia's Marta Robezniece and Kitilkala Bogdanova finished third in the European Championships (0.260 seconds back).