Knife-edge victory for Zöggeler - Kraushaar wins women’s competition - Schiegl/Schiegl doubles champions
Winterberg. The weather god showed no mercy: Due to the heavy snowfall the second part of the Two-Track European Championships had to be ended after the elimination runs. Owing to the bad weather the semi-finals and finals could not be carried out under regular conditions.
Therefore, in all three disciplines the results after the elimination runs were rated. Georg Hackl (Berchtesgaden) won this day’s men’s race; Sylke Otto was first in the women’s race. In the final rating the Italian Armin Zöggeler and Georg Hackl both had 185 points, which meant that Armin Zöggeler won due to his faster total time (103.513 compared with 103.688 seconds). Markus Prock from Austria ended up third (130 points). In the women’s competition, Olympic champion Silke Kraushaar (185) ended up first in front of Sylke Otto (170) and Barbara Niedernhuber (145).
The Austrians Tobias and Markus Schiegl (185 points) were the winners of the doubles competition in front of Steffen Skel/Steffen Wöller (170) from Winterberg and the Italians Gerhard Plankensteiner/Oswald Haselrieder (140).
Opinions:
Georg Hackl: „I am more than happy. This is a top result for me. The jury’s decision to stop the race was absolutely correct. Armin Zöggeler genuinely deserves to be the winner of the Two-Track European Championships“.
Silke Kraushaar: „For me this title is just as important as every other title. It was right to stop the race, as otherwise the winners would have been determined by mere coincidence.“
Tobias Schiegl: „Everything went perfect for us. After our two titles as World Champions this is our greatest success. We are totally happy“.
(January 5, 2001)
