Russian bobsledders Alexander Zubkov and Alexei Voyevoda have won the bronze medal in the two-man bob competition at the Vancouver Olympics. The gold and silver medals went to the German bobsledders, and small wonder, since bobsleigh is the number one sport in Germany.
Alexander Zubkov and Alexei Voyevoda won silver medals as part of a four-bob crew in Turin four years ago. In Italy they also lost to Germans, coming in less than a second later. But in Vancouver the two performed quite a feat of heroism by finishing third-best, because in the finals they competed in a borrowed bob. They had crashed their own one during a training run. They owe their bronze medal to the physical strength of Alexei Voyevoda, who made their bob pick up speed at the start in no time, and thanks also to the piloting skills of Alexander Zubkov.
The Whistler sliding centre track is quite involved, fast (with athletes reaching the speed of 150 kilometres per hour) and very dangerous. Four bobs overturned during the first two runs, including that of the Canadian bobsledder Lyndon Rush, who knows the track inside out. Yet another competition leader Beat Hefty of Switzerland was injured and withdrew from competition. So, to win, a crew was to pick up speed and keep their bob on the right path all along the track. Zubkov and Voyevoda manned their bob with a sure hand throughout the four runs and only let two German crews overtake them.
Unfortunately, it was next to impossible to gain a still greater speed and get ahead of the Germans. The German crews, Alexander Zubkov says, boast superfast bobs, with entire factories working for the national bobsleigh team. But the Germans were amazed to see that we came in right after them, that Russian bobsledders can compete with them in real terms.
"The race proved really hard, every single run of it, says Alexander Zubkov. Our primary objective was to win at the start, so we would be able to pick up speed and then try to keep it throughout the run. Well, we did it, but then we'd been training for a whole four years before coming to Vancouver. I think we did everything the way we had planned, and we are really happy about it.
The president of the Russian Federation of Bobsleigh and Skeleton Nikita Muzyria admits that Russians wouldn't even dream about winning the Olympic bronze medal in the two-man bob event only a few years ago. But he promised that Russians would put on a better performance during the 22d Winter Olympics in Sochi in 2014.
Meanwhile in Vancouver Russians are due to compete in yet another event; - four-man bobsled, which also provides for an opportunity to boast high-speed runs while maintaining the correct trajectory.
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