Two favorites make a mistake, Elina Bota shines

Sigulda (FIL/04 Jan 2025) A new name has been added to the list of winners of the EBERSPAECHER Luge World Cup since the race in Sigulda: Elina Bota. And yet she is an "old" familar face. Until last season, she competed under her birth name Elina Vitola. But last summer she married the doubles pilot Martins Bots and changed her name. The 24-year-old Latvian is particularly pleased about her third World Cup victory. “It's so wonderful because I won on my home track in front of my family and my fans,” she said beaming with joy after the award ceremony. She laid the foundation for success in the first run with the best time of 41.534 seconds. But even the sixth-best time (41.746) in the second run was enough to win. 0.064 seconds was her lead over Merle Fräbel (Germany). “It was quite an rollercoaster,” explained Fräbel, “in the first run I had some problems with the start curve. That's annoying because then you lack momentum coming out of the bottom. In the second run, I did better. Then you see what you can achieve.” Austrian luger Lisa Schulte followed by the smallest margin of one thousandth of a second. ‘I am absolutely happy that I managed both runs so well,’ said the reigning world champion. She also leads the interim World Cup standings with 296 points. For the first time in her career.

She benefited from the mistakes of the two favorites, Madeleine Egle (Austria) and Julia Taubitz (Germany). Egle crashed into the boards right after the start. With her time of 44.748 seconds, she did not even make it into the second run. Taubitz, who had the second-best time in the first run (41.580), made a mistake in the second run and fell back to ninth place with the twelfth-fastest time, 0.216 seconds behind. She is second in the World Cup ranking, just two points behind. Third: Madeleine Egle (259).

Kendija Aparjoda also took the opportunity to use her home advantage. The winner of the Nations Cup came in fourth (0.089 seconds back), followed by the two Americans Ashley Farquharson (0.144) and Emily Sweeney (0.154).