Gough rebounds from podium miss to help Canada win luge relay silver

WHISTLER, B.C. – After just missing the podium in the women’s race Alex Gough wasn’t going to be denied in the relay at the luge World Cup.

Gough was part of the Canadian team that finished second in the relay at the Whistler Sliding Centre on Saturday. It was just the second time Canada won a World Cup luge medal on home soil.

“I had a good run and these guys put down good runs,” said Gough, shouting over the cheers and ringing bells from a loud crowd.

“It’s a great feeling when it’s a team competition. You just come together. Everybody does their job and it works out well.”

Gough finished fourth in the women’s singles race earlier in the evening.

Joining Gough on the relay podium was Calgary’s Sam Edney, who raced the men’s singles, and the doubles team of Tristan Walker of Cochrane, Alta., and Justin Snith of Calgary.

“There’s a lot of energy in this place,” said Edney, who finished fifth in Friday night’s men’s race. “We have a lot of fun.

“We know that we can slide well and are good in this event.”

Germany won the gold medal in a time of two minutes 18.773 seconds.

The Canadians were clocked in 2:19.001 while Russia took bronze in 2:19.162.

In the relay, each country starts by racing a single woman, followed by a single man, then a double. All begin from the same start.

It was the first time the relay had been held in Canada. It will be a medal event at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.

Canada is gaining the reputation as a relay power. The same Canadian team won the race in the opening luge World Cup at Igls, Austria.

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Gough shrugged her shoulders when asked why Canada is good in the event.

“We just have fun,” she said with a laugh.

Edney said the Canadians head to the start gate brimming with confidence.

“We are feeding off the energy everybody has,” he said. “We have one the best women in the sport right now.

“I feel like I have had a pretty good start and we have a young doubles team that is just charging down the hill every time they get on the sled. I think that confidence we have is something we feed off. We feel we have the best team at the start. People know we are the ones to beat.”

The only other Canadian to win a World Cup luge medal at home was Tyler Seitz who won bronze in Calgary in 2002.

Gough just missed the podium in the women’s race.

Germany’s Natalie Geisenberger won in a two-run combined time of 1:23.439 seconds. She edged out teammate and Olympic champion Tatjana Hufner, who was second in 1:23.482.

Russia’s Tatiana Ivanova was third in 1:23.606.

Gough finished in 1:23.685.

“It’s tough to be so close and not quite there,” said the 24-year-old from Calgary. “That’s racing. Some days it’s there and some days it’s not.”

Geisenberger let out a squeal of delight when her teammate Hufner failed to catch her on the final run.

Gough blamed a mistake on her first run for her final time of 1:23.685.

“I just couldn’t put it together in the first run as nice as I would have liked,” she said.

“I was close even with a mistake. It was a good race for me. I slid really well. I was happy with that.”

Canada had four women in the singles.

Beside Gough, Arianne Jones of Calgary was 10th in 1:24.286, Kimberley McRae of Calgary 11th in 1:24.293 and Dayna Clay of Calgary 16th in 1:24.616.

Luge head coach Wolfgang Staudinger said the relay silver capped a positive couple days for the Canadian team.

“We had a very good weekend,” he said. “We have to be happy and I’m very happy about it.”

The Canadian team hopes to carry the momentum into next weekend’s World Cup in Calgary.

“We are going to build off this result today,” said Edney. “We can feed off this team result going into next week and post some really good results in the individual races.”

Gough became the first Canadian to win a luge World Cup when she won a race in Paramonovo, Russia. She also was third at the world championships and collected three other World Cup bronzes.

She opened this season by finishing third in the season-opening World Cup.

The World Cup is the first major international luge competition held at the Whistler venue since the 2010 Winter Olympics, when Georgian athlete Nodar Kumaritashvili died in a horrific crash just hours prior to the opening ceremonies.

The 21-year-old Kumaritashvili lost control of his sled while travelling at speeds of more than 144 kilometres going into Turn 16. He flew off the track and slammed into a metal post.

No athletes from Georgia competed at Whistler or raced at Igls.

Since the Games the $104.9-million Whistler venue has undergone subtle changes and safety features have been improved. Teams were also given extra training time on the 1,140-metre-long track leading up to this year’s competition.

Work has been done on the track’s concrete that affects the profile of the ice and simplifies the driving lines. Some modifications have been made to change the shape of certain curves.

Kumaritashvili’s death resulted in the luge starts being lowered for the Olympics. The men started from what was the women’s start and the women dropped to the junior start position.

Those same starts are being used this weekend.