Team Hall slide to silverware double in Winterberg

Bobsleigh 08 Jan 23

Brad Hall led Britain’s bobsleigh stars to a dazzling double success with a 4-man silver medal in Winterberg.

Just 24 hours after Hall and Taylor Lawrence secured bronze in the 2-man event, Arran Gulliver and Greg Cackett joined the party to help cap a stunning weekend on the track.

The British crew won their maiden World Cup gold in the final race of 2022 but were beaten to first-place on Sunday by double Olympic and world champion Francesco Friedrich, who grabbed glory on home German soil.

Hall admits he was thrilled with his team's resilience following a frustrating start at the wheel.

He said: "This weekend has been tough, my driving hasn’t been great. But I still came away with two medals.

"To be sixth today after the first heat was quite disappointing.

"We then rectified it with the best start time in second run - my brakemen did an amazing job."

Despite a disappointing first run where they placed sixth in a time of 54.76, the Brits stormed back with the fastest start and overall time in Run 2.

A combined time of 1 minute 49.25 seconds placed them 0.18 behind Friedrich and two hundredths clear of the third-placed team led by fellow German Johannes Lochner.

The result marks the sixth World Cup medal out of a possible eight for the British crew this season.

A day earlier, Hall and Lawrence had bagged bronze in the 2-man in a combined time of 1 minute 51.44 seconds, starting the new year with a third medal in as many races together.

Hall hadn’t previously medalled at Winterberg in the event

but made the podium this time as only Olympic silver medallist Lochner and Switzerland’s Michael Vogt finished above the Brits in tricky conditions.

Lawrence helped Hall to the second-best start in both runs, clocking 5.14 and 5.11 seconds off the top, as Lochner and his brakeman Georg Fleischhauer were the only team to go quicker in the initial part of the race.

Hall and Lawrence sat third at halfway and retained that position in Run 2, as Vogt jumped ahead of them into silver but Germany’s Olympic four-man bronze medallist Christop Hafer fell back to fourth in an 18-strong field.

“Winning a medal shouldn’t be taken for granted despite the success so far this season and it’s a good way to start the new year,” said Hall.

"We wanted to keep the momentum going from the races in North America and we’ve done that. Taylor gave me two great starts and he’s shown again that he’s adapting brilliantly to two-man.

“We hadn’t had great results in the two-man here before so I was a little apprehensive of that and the disappointing two-man result from Lake Placid when we finished fifth was playing on my mind a little bit beforehand. But we managed to come away with a bronze and we’re really happy with that result. 

“I’m not as happy with the performance as I am with the result, though, to be honest. Taylor was exceptional with the push but I couldn’t quite get the driving right today. We’re now starting to see winning a medal as a minimum standard. We know we’ve got the talent in the push and I’m very confident driving four-man at this track.”

The World Cup action stays in Germany for the next fortnight, with Altenberg hosting back-to-back races prior to the World Championships in St. Moritz at the end of January and start of February.

Sportsbeat 2022

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