Bob World Cup
Dominance continues: Germany fetches all three medals
09.03.2025 – 6:49 p.m.Reading time: 2 min.
The German dominance in the bob continues. Once again Francesco Friedrich crowned himself world champion – in front of two other Germans.
22 years after the gold of André Lange, Francesco Friedrich is once again a German bob world champion in Lake Placid. The two-time double Olympic champion from Pirna once again crowned the king of two. It was the ninth World Cup gold for the 34-year-old with just one exception (2023).
With two running times in four runs, the Saxon with a slip Alexander Schüller prevailed on the demanding railway on Mount van Hoevenberg with a 0.03 seconds ahead of his permanent rival Johannes Lochner, who with Georg Fleischhauer could only break the dominance of the exceptional pilot in St. Moritz in 2023.
The only 23-year-old Adam Ammour rounded off the strong performance of the Germans with Benedikt Hertel. The third triple success in the small slide after 2021 in Altenberg and 2024 in Winterberg is still becoming more important in the US state of New York, since the German Bobs in 2009 and 2012 remained on the train without World Cup gold.
After the narrow half-time lead of Friedrich with 14 hundredths of a second (“This is not a big upholstered on the difficult path”), on the final day with start number one in the third round, he grabbed the ancient track record of the Canadian Pierre Lueders from 2003. In addition, the Pirnaer improved to 5.04 seconds after only Ammour (5.12), then Lochner (5.05) were better in the first two runs when pushing.
But Lochner added again and blew with a train record in 54.52 seconds to attack gold. Before the final run, the Berchtesgadener reduced the gap to Friedrich to just six hundredths. As in the first run, he had not driven the harassment optimally. So there was still potential for improvement for the final on the difficult path, which with 20 curves has the highest number of corporations worldwide.
In the fourth run at Schneefall, Lochner presented again with 5.01 seconds at the start, drove almost ideal line in the ice channel and already cheered at the finish line, even though Friedrich was still at the top. Friedrich was already behind in between and caught up in the last corners. “How does he do that?” Lochner called and fired his helmet on the floor. Friedrich countered in the manner of a dominator and once again drove to victory in his long -standing parade discipline. “Yes,” he screamed out at the finish line. Together with the four-man bob, it was his 15th World Cup title.