Games sled track wows champion
Athletes hit 121 km/h in test run at Whistler Sliding Centre
Jeff Lee, Vancouver Sun
Published: Saturday, December 22, 2007
From only a little more than halfway up the track, Canadian bobsledding icon Pierre Lueders and his brakeman Justin Kripps learned a startling fact about the new $104.5-million Whistler Sliding Centre.
It will be far faster than originally designed.
Pushing off lightly last Tuesday from the beginner's start gate -- the sledding equivalent of the bunny hill -- the two men were shocked when they hit speeds of 121 km/h.
And that was from a standing start in a sled with non-competition runners on a track that hadn't been groomed for a race.
"That is very, very uncommon because you're halfway down the hill," Lueders said in an interview Friday. "It is not like any track that exists in the world."
Lueders, Canada's most decorated sledder and a four-time Olympian, and Kripps, a new sledder from Summerland, became the first sliders to try out the new track.
In a test that was kept hush-hush from the public, the two men, who represent one of Canada's best chances for gold in bobsled at the 2010 Winter Olympics, made a series of six runs that started two-thirds the way up the 1.4-km-long track.
They tested 10 curves and tried out the track's new ice-making capabilities.
The tests took place only a few days after Vanoc declared the facility competition ready, but were only made public Friday.
When Vanoc gave media a tour of the centre a week ago they said major testing wouldn't get underway until sometime in the New Year.
But when it became apparent the lower end of the track had iced up quicker than originally planned, officials decided to test it out.
Lueders, who was also the first person to test the track built for the 2006 Turin Games, had hinted to The Vancouver Sun last month that he was hoping to test the Whistler track before the international sporting federations officially certify it in March.
Vanoc said the first runs were necessary to test the the newly formed ice. Officials turned on the refrigeration system several weeks ago after installing 25,000 pounds of ammonia, but they had no way of knowing how well the track would perform until they put a sled on it.
On Tuesday, sliding centre director Craig Lehto gave the go-ahead for the test when weather and track conditions became ideal. And he could think of no one better to christen the track than Lueders.
"The first test run down a new sliding track is a big moment -- and who better to take it than Pierre, one of the world's premier bobsleigh drivers and Justin, his brakeman," Lehto said in a Vanoc statement.
Lueders, won a gold medal in the two-man bobsled at the 1998 Nagano Winter Games and a silver in Turin, said he was a bit apprehensive but not worried about crashing.
"Every time you go down a track there is a lot of apprehension, a lot of wonder," he said. "All the construction people and designers were wondering, it's one thing to do something in a computer, a simulation, and make a plan with all these corners, but it is still the million-dollar question when somebody goes down the hill."
He and Kripps, who only started his competitive sledding career two years ago, immediately discovered the track, one of the steepest in the world, will exceed original top speed projections of 138 km/h.
And under the right conditions a four-man bobsled could surpass the record of 147 km/h on the 1,700-metre track at St. Moritz, Switzerland, he said.
"It's hard to say. You have to take into consideration nobody was pushing. Second, we were starting from halfway down, and third, the preparation of the ice will only get better and smoother. And the runners I was using weren't race-polished."
"We're pleased with the way the track performed in these first test runs and made a few adjustments and observations that simply can't happen until a sled actually takes to the ice," Lehto said. "The next step will be to test skeleton and luge sleds as well."
The two sliders, accompanied by Terry Gudzowsky, a technical delegate from the International Bobsleigh Federation, first walked the track, inspecting the section they were to test. Then, with workers cheering them on, Lueders and Kripps took off.
On their first run, they hit an ice ridge at the bottom, giving them some unexpected air time. The ridge was shaved off for future runs.
The bobsled federation and the International Luge Federation will certify the track in March.
The first international competition will be the FIBT World Cup in February 2009.
jefflee@png.canwest.com