Team Austria wins Team Relay in Altenberg

Altenberg (FIL/05.02.2023) The Team Relay marked the usual exciting and emotional end of the successful World Cup weekend on the technically demanding track in Altenberg. Failing to finish twice in Sigulda last time, Team Austria triumphed ahead of Germany and Latvia in front of over 1000 spectators. Over the entire week, more than 2000 fans followed the luge action in Altenberg's Kohlgrund.

The Austrian quartet with Madeleine Egle, Wolfgang Kindl and the double Yannick Müller/Armin Frauscher broke the relay curse in the World Cup and won ahead of Team Germany with Julia Taubitz, Max Langenhan and Toni Eggert/Sascha Benecken (+0.098 sec.) and Team Latvia with Elina Ieva Vitola, Kristers Aparjods and the double Martins Bots/Roberts Plume (+0.139 sec.).

The team relays from Italy, USA and Romania finished fourth to sixth. Since Team Canada crashed, nine of the ten starting Team Relays finished.

“We had real speed today, so it's fun,” said a delighted Wolfgang Kindl. “It was a nice weekend. You wouldn't believe how difficult it is to adjust when it's slow during training and gets fast during the competition. It was relatively difficult for us, but it worked for the team relay.” Madeleine Egle was comforted by the relay victory over the ungrateful fourth place in the individual. “In the individual I messed it up myself, but the ride today and the victory in the team give me self-confidence for the next World Cups.”

It was the fourth relay success for the Vice World Champions from Austria. In the overall ranking of the EBERSPÄCHER Team Relay World Cup presented by BMW, Germany took the lead with 355 points, tied with Latvia, ahead of Italy.

Detailed results of the 4th EBERSPÄCHER Team Relay World Cup presented by BMW can be found here: https://www.fil-luge.org/de/ergebnisse/eberspaecher-team-staffel-weltcup-presented-by-bmw-1