Former World champion Erin Hamlin will lead women’s US squad
Lake Placid (pps) Former World champion Erin Hamlin will lead the women’s squad of the US national luge team in the upcoming 2011-2012 season. Tony Benshoof, 2006 Olympic fourth-placed at the Winter Games in Torino, will rejoin the USA Luge squad, while four-time Olympian Bengt Walden, on the other hand, will retire. 2010 Olympic six-place finisher Christian Niccum, along with new partnerJayson Terdiman, who celebrated a third place at the Viessmann Luge World Cup event in Winterberg last season, are heading the US doubles’ squad. This has been announced by USA Luge.
Hamlin will be joined by Ashley Walden and Julia Clukey. Emily Sweeney has also been selected for the team, even though she is still eligible to compete in junior events. The second doubles’ team, apart from Niccum-Terdiman, will be Matt Mortensen-Preston Griffal. Three-time Olympian Tony Benshoof, who took a break in the post-Olympic season to tend to his ailing mother who passed away in March, will be joined by Chris Mazdzer, Robby Huerbin and Taylor Morris.
Bengt Walden, a native of Sweden who celebrated a sixth place at the 2009 World Championships in Lake Placid, competed in three Olympic Games (1994, 1998 and 2002) for his native country. After his marriage to Ashley Hayden in 2007, he then competed for USA Luge and earned a 15th place at the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver.
