German duo wins Olympic luge doubles in Nagano

February 13, 1998

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German duo wins Olympic luge doubles in Nagano

Stefan Krausse and Jan Behrendt

(Spiral, Nagano City)
14:00- Start

Germany swept the gold medals in the Nagano Olympic luge competition as Stefan Krausse and Jan Behrendt beat Americans Chris Thorpe and Gordy Sheer in the doubles event Friday.

Krausse and Behrendt, the 1992 Albertville Olympic champions, amassed a combined time of 1 minute, 41.105 over two runs down the Spiral track in northern Nagano for a 0.022-second win over Thorpe and Sheer, last season's World Cup overall leaders.

The Americans broke the track record they set here last year on the way to a third-place finish in the World Cup finale on Friday's first run and then posted the day's best time of 50.493 seconds in the second race to reclaim the track record that had been broken three more times during the one-day competition.

Mark Grimmette and Brian Martin of the United States came in third with a time of 1:41.217 as the top seven finishers after the first run ended in the exact same order in the final.

Austrian pair Tobias Schiegl and Markus Schiegl finished fourth, followed by Italy's Kurt Brugger and Wilfried Huber.

Silke Kraushaar and German teammate Barbara Niedernhuber finished 1-2 in the women's singles contest on Wednesday while countryman Georg Hackl claimed his third straight Olympic gold medal in the men's singles last Monday. (Kyodo News)

Results of double luge Friday in the 18th Olympic Winter Games at Spiral, Nagano (course 1,194 meters, vertical drop 96 meters):

1. Stefan Krausse and Jan Behrendt, Germany

1 minute, 41.105 seconds (first run 50.592, second run 50.513)

2. Chris Thorpe and Gordy Sheer, U.S.

1:41.127 (50.634, 50.493)

3. Mark Grimmette and Brian Martin, U.S.

1:41.217 (50.716, 50.501)

4. Tobias Schiegl and Markus Schiegl, Austria

1:41.421 (50.846, 50.575)

5. Kurt Brugger and Wilfried Huber, Italy

1:41.768 (50.897, 50.871)

6. Gerhard Plankensteiner and Oswald Haselrieder, Italy

1:41.917 (51.084, 50.833)

7. Igor Urbanski and Andrej Muhin, Ukraine

1:41.968 (51.262, 50.706)

8. Steffen Skel and Steffen Woeller, Germany

1:42.224 (51.408, 50.816)

9. Danil Tchaban and Viktor Kneib, Russia

1:42.393 (51.370, 51.023)

10. Albert Demtchenko and Semen Kolobaev, Russia

1:42.556 (51.515, 51.041)

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14. Atsushi Sasaki and Kei Takahashi, Japan

1:43.376 (51.541, 51.835)

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