Fifth victory of the season, two best times, first overall World Cup: Johannes Ludwig excels in Oberhof

Oberhof (FIL) What a demonstration of his class Johannes Ludwig showed at the EBERSPÄCHER Luge World Cup. On his home track in Oberhof, the 35-year-old not only won the fifth race this season, but also secured the overall World Cup title already before the World Cup final in St. Moritz.

The German has a 146-point lead over Wolfgang Kindl (Austria), who finished fifth. Behind Ludwig were his teammates Max Langenhan, 0.304 seconds behind, and Felix Loch (0.316). Fourth place went to Nico Gleitscher (Austria/0.412).

 "Of course the importance of the overall World Cup is very very high," said 35-year-old luger of RSR Rennsteig Oberhof, "I never had the title in my career." Winning the crystal globe shows the consistency over the season, he said. And this one he calls the best of his entire career. He had already made his debut in the racing series in 2006. "You can already say that I'm getting better and better the older I get," Ludwig said. He describes the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, when he won bronze in the individual and gold in the team relay, as the crux of his career.

On the 1096-meter track, Ludwig demonstrated his current special position. In the first run was 42.554 seconds - track record. In run two he improved this record once again to 42.515 seconds. The competitors could only marvel in view of the flawless runs. "There is still a nice gap to Hansi," said Langenhan (22) appreciatively. The only drop of bitterness: on Friday, teammate Moritz Bollmann took the start record from him in 7.084 seconds. Ludwig's best time on Saturday was 7.088 seconds.

That Nico Gleirscher had become "best of the rest" behind the German trio was only a small consolation for the 24-year-old Tyrolean. "A few little things were missing," he said, "at the start, especially in Oberhof, I have a hard time." He wants to work on that until next year, when the World Championships will be held in Thuringia. Nevertheless, he travels on with a positive feeling: "The bottom line is that they were the best runs this week." Those of Johannes Ludwig, however, were once again significantly better.

Results 8th EBERSPÄCHER Luge World Cup in Oberhof: https://www.fil-luge.org/de/ergebnisse/eberspaecher-weltcup-15