Igls, Austria (pps) Georg Hackl missed his 33rd win in the Viessmann Luge World Cup by just seven hundredths of a second on his home-track at Koenigssee, Germany. The next opportunity for the three-time Olympic champion to join record winner Markus Prock, Austria (33 victories), will be next weekend on the 1976 Olympic track at Innsbruck, Igls, Austria.

Hackl has a great chance: Last year the German won the Viessmann Luge World Cup event at Igls and in 1997 he achieved the last of his three World titles on the track at Patscherkofel Mountain. In addition, Hackl’s form has clearly improved in the current season. He achieved seventh, fifth, fourth, third and second position so far. However, Hackl does not like statistics: “I rather count my Olympic victories; that’s enough for me.”

The road to a record-win leads over Russia’s Albert Demchenko, the dominating luger in the pre-Olympic winter who is leading in the overall rankings with three victories.

Not only Georg Hackl could get even with Markus Prock on the 2007 World Championship

track. Germany’s Sylke Otto, four-time World and 2002 Olympic champion, has achieved 32 World Cup wins up to now. She is in a clear lead in the women’s event, followed by Germany’s Silke Kraushaar with 24 World Cup victories. However, Otto is still waiting for her first win in the current pre-Olympic winter. Her German team-mate Barbara Niedernhuber is top in the overall rankings.

In spite of crashing at Lake Placid, Germany’s World silver medallists André Florschuetz- Torsten Wustlich took over the “Yellow Shirt” of the World Cup leaders by finishing runnersup at Koenigssee. André Florschuetz admitted: “We had reckoned with that position only at the World Cup finals.” Florschuetz considers the two Austrian doubles with Andreas Linger- Wolfgang Linger and Tobias Schiegl-Markus Schiegl their strongest competitors besides Patric Leitner-Alexander Resch. The German World and Olympic champions celebrated a very successful comeback to the Viessmann Luge World Cup after injury when winning the race at Koenigssee. “The Austrians are always very strong on their home-track. You have to beat them to win”, André Florschuetz disclosed.