Garmisch-Partenkirchen (ck) After the trip to Canada the Natural Luge World Cup is being continued in Europe this coming weekend. Only few athletes took the detour and competed in the test event for next years World Championships in Latsch (ITA), which was held just the two days before the race in Garmisch, on Jan 14th and 15th. Spokesman of the athletes, Gerhard Pilz (AUT) explained the situation: "Latsch did not want to host a World Cup because they wanted to keep the race open for all athletes not only for these who are in the World Cup. But with the date during the week, most of us cannot afford to take these days off. Moscow’s World Cup is on weekdays, too, that consumes too many days off from work. Only few of us are professional lugers, most have to work their daily jobs." So the plan to have as many athletes as possible in Latsch turn out the other way round: most of the top racers went straight to Garmisch-Partenkirchen, where the trainings should start at Friday noon. So far the weather forecast promises cold weather, so that the race can take place as scheduled.

Gerhard Pilz, who did not do the trip to Grande Prairie, will join the Austrian team in Garmisch again. That is, if he can qualify, so he said. The rule for the strong Austrian team says that the World Cup racer with least points has to race against the strongest junior. "The rules are the same for everybody and if I cannot win the qualification against a junior racer I do not deserve to participate in the World Cup," said the five-times World Champion. "The only disadvantage is that you cannot try a lot for the race, if your training run counts as qualification," he added. His injury because of which he had skipped the Canada race, is still not fully healed: "I damaged my shoulder during the summer training and with my bad start times in Olang it showed that I do have problems. I hope the rest at the beginning of the year did some good."

The double seaters Harald Kleinhofer and Gerhard Mühlbacher (AUT) can smile again: their sled which had disappeared somewhere along the trip from Salzburg to Grande Prairie has been found and so they can race on their own sled in Germany.

An eye should be kept on the women´s event: after serial winner Sonja Steinacher (ITA) has retired the fight to become her successor seems to be a close and tough one between Ekatharina Lavretjeva (RUS) and the Italian rookie Renate Kasslatter.

Schedule for Garmisch-Partenkirchen:

Friday, Jan 16th: training runs starting at noon
Saturday, Jan 17th: doubleseater and women’s race starting at 9:30h
Sunday, Jan 18th: men’s race starting at 9:30h

The track:
Length: 1100m
Average descent: 14,7%
Difference of altitude: 153m