Laura Nolte’s heart-warming smile tipped over after the Olympic premiere in monobob, tears rolled down. Ironically, the only 23-year-old Olympic debutant had to explain after her fourth place why the gold series of the Germans in the Yanqing ice channel broke.
“Two good runs at the Olympics are not enough, at the Olympics you need four runs for a medal,” said the woman from Winterberg. She walked over to 36-year-old Kaillie Humphries appreciatively and hugged the winner. “Kaillie has such a blatant instinct, she immediately notices if the sled is a millimeter at an angle and can correct it immediately,” praised Nolte.
Criticism of the still unpopular discipline
When she saw Bob on television in elementary school, Nolte admired Humphries, who once drove for Canada and who, after a dispute with the association, has now won gold for the USA for the first time. Second was her compatriot Elana Meyers Taylor. The Canadian Christine de Bruin, who was ultimately 0.30 seconds faster than Nolte, secured bronze. European Champion Mariama Jamanka from Oberhof was 13th. “In the end, it was important to me that I could somehow finish the mono competition well. I managed that. Check it out, concentrate on the two,” said Jamanka.
She renewed the criticism of the still unloved discipline, since the European title in St. Moritz also played no role. “My opinion hasn’t changed. My brakewomen have had a nice week now,” she said sarcastically: “They dragged the sled for me, polished the runners and now had nothing from the competition.” Many pilots criticize the new discipline and would have preferred to do the four-man bobsleigh, as the team spirit cannot be lived out in the mono sled.
“Trying to make the best of it”
In addition, there was hardly any lead time. First competitions two years ago, in the Olympic winter for the first time also at the World Cup. “Normally, the preparation time for an Olympic event is usually longer than two years including the Olympic season. But we tried to make the best of it and made a tremendous development,” said Jamanka. Nolte emphasized that although the preparation time was the same for everyone, the women drivers have an advantage “who generally have more feeling in the steering cables”. Nevertheless, she is happy “that there is monobob at the Olympics.” After all, she learned to drive in such a small sled and won in 2016 in the monobob at the Youth Olympic Games.
After training, after three best times, she was already dreaming of a medal. Jamaica was once the fastest too. “There was a lot of hope that we could fight for medals with both of them,” said head coach René Spies. “In the end, the three with the most experience are up front,” said Spies.
For Jamaica, the medals were out of reach after the first day. “Yesterday was incredibly bad, so I’m dissatisfied. You saw what would have gone,” said the 31-year-old. “The first day was so disastrous. Whatever the outcome, it wouldn’t have been a good competition.”
Jamanka now only has a look at the two-man bobsleigh, where she wants to drive to the Olympic victory like four years ago. “I hope that I can do better all the time,” said Jamanka. The two solid runs on Monday should have given her a boost. In addition, the Germans now all drive in their own FES sled instead of the uniform bob from the world association.