Canadian bobsledders making it to podiums all over North America
Momentum is everything in bobsled, and Team Canada has it going for them from top to bottom.
They have already claimed eight of the young season’s 27 World Cup medals, including three gold, from tour stops in Lake Placid, Park City and Whistler. Pilot Kaillie Humphries hasn’t missed the podium and tops the women’s points race. Justin Kripps is first overall in two-man and third in four-man; Chris Spring is second in two-man, seventh in fourman.
And if the Olympics started today, Canada would have the maximum number of sleds in each discipline.
“It’s awesome when a plan comes together like that,” said Bobsleigh Canada Skeleton’s high performance director Chris Le Bihan.
The plan was to dominate the three North American tracks before switching to five venues in Europe, where their German, Russian and Latvian rivals train most. The Americans actually beat Canada with 10 medals from the unofficial first half of the season on this side of the pond, but Germany settled for just five, and that’s an important distinction.
Because Germany will be particularly tough to beat on home soil at Winterberg, Altenberg and Konigsee. Even so, Le Bihan is almost positive the Canadian roll will continue.
“I think we’re sitting in a great position for two reasons,” he began. “One of them is it’s very hard to slow down momentum. The pilots on the teams right now know they can do it. They’ve done it, so it’s like ‘OK, take that stressor off our backs.’
“The second piece is we’re pushing really, really fast and that’s a big change from last year where we were hovering somewhere around the 10th-ranked pushes.”
This year they’re near the top in all three disciplines. It’s an enviable spot, particularly headed into December races at Winterberg and Igls, Austria, essentially gliders’ tracks, where a lead off the start is not easily eroded.
“Our teams are pushing really well, better than we have in the past couple of years and I feel I’m driving pretty well also,” said Kripps. “It’s a combination of things and in bobsled, you often don’t really know what’s working and what isn’t. If it’s working, you try to keep it the same.”
But change is inevitable as teams strive for the right mix of pilot and brakeman, or pilot and crew in the four-man sleds. Humphries and brakeman Melissa Lotholz have been the only constant through North America.
Under head coach Todd Hays, Team Canada has adopted a slightly different approach to figuring out those combinations and permutations. Brakeman Alex Kopacz said the new tack, focused on pushing and driving performance, is key.
“We have a coach in place who is looking purely at results and is not really that interested in chemistry. He’s trying to build a global chemistry, not so much individual chemistry. In the past we were focused on individual teams having their chemistry, on bonding and growing and things like this. Now it’s all performance based.
“It’s an interesting mix and currently it is working very well and it’s exciting to be part of it because it definitely makes Canada as a whole stronger.”
Le Bihan said the shift in philosophy wasn’t massive, but it has been influential.
“The head coach has come at this with a little bit of a different strategy and it wasn’t without some bumps in the road, changing the culture of how we’ve done things over this quad. We’re not talking drastic change here but Todd Hays has really put the onus on quantifiable numbers and it’s been working out great.”
His job of finding the most effective mix has no doubt been made easier by the depth of the talent pool, which has certainly caught Le Bihan’s attention.
“The reality is we have the deepest group of brakemen, the deepest group of talent that maybe we’ve ever had at Bobsleigh Canada Skeleton. All the pilots are getting the horsepower they need to give them a chance to get on the podium.”
The pilots are taking it from there. Humphries has driven to two gold and a silver, Kripps three silver, Spring a gold and a bronze.
Next generation pilots Alyssia Rissling, Christine de Bruin and Nick Poloniato are doing their part as well, with a string of top-10 finishes that will be crucial to ensuring Canada qualifies the maximum number of sleds for Korea.
Momentum is most definitely theirs.
“When you know you can get the results, you are able to just kind of relax and let things happen, especially with driving,” said Kripps. “You can let the sled run a little bit more.”