Geisenberger opens luge season with win
INNSBRUCK, Austria, Nov 24, (AP): Natalie Geisenberger’s quest for a seventh straight World Cup women’s overall championship is off to an excellent start.
The two-time defending Olympic luge champion led a German sweep of the top three spots in the World Cup opening race Saturday. She finished her two runs at the Igls-Innsbruck track in 1 minute, 19.619 seconds for her 44th World Cup victory, extending her record.
Julia Taubitz was second in 1:19.655, and Tatjana Huefner was third in 1:19.885. Russia’s Tatyana Ivanova was fourth, Italy’s Andrea Voetter got fifth and Summer Britcher was the top US finisher in sixth.
Geisenberger is aiming to become the second slider to win seven straight World Cup luge overall titles. Austria’s Markus Prock won the men’s points race seven straight times from 1990-91 through 1996-97.
Austria took the doubles gold on home ice, with Thomas Steu and Lorenz Koller posting the fastest time in both heats and easily getting their first World Cup win in 1:19.476.
The German team of Toni Eggert – who is racing despite a broken leg during training – and Sascha Benecken was second in 1:19.656, and the Russian duo of Vladislav Yuzhakov and Iurii Prokhorov was third in 1:19.758.
Olympic men’s silver medalist Chris Mazdzer is competing in singles and doubles this season. He made his World Cup doubles debut with Jayson Terdiman, and they finished 10th for the US.
The men’s race and the sprint events are Sunday in Innsbruck. The tour then continues next weekend in Whistler, British Columbia, with racing on Nov 30 (doubles, men’s singles) and Dec 1 (women, team relay).
The Canadians qualified by defeating Hong Kong 27-10 in the rain on a chewed-up field in Marseille, with two brilliant tries by record try-scorer DTH van der Merwe.
As the unbeaten winner of the fourteam repechage, Canada filled out Pool B in Japan, where it will play past champions New Zealand and South Africa, Italy, and Namibia in a 17-day span from September.
Canada has opposed all four teams previously at Rugby World Cups, and beaten only Namibia, in 1999. Canada’s best finish was the quarterfinals in 1991, when it lost to New Zealand.
Japan 32, Russians 27 In Gloucester, England, Japan were forced to come from behind to scrape a narrow 32-27 win over Russia at the Kingsholm Stadium on Saturday in a meeting between the two countries who will kick off next year’s World Cup.
Japan, who had chosen a youthful side for their last international of the year after impressing against England at Twickenham last weekend, outscored the Russians four tries to two but were behind going into the final 10 minutes.
Captain Michael Leitch scored two tries for Japan with Kenki Fukuoka and Hendrik Tui also dotting down while Vladimir Ostrushko and Stanislav Selskiy went over for the Russians, who also saw Yury Kushnarev contribute 11 points with the boot.
England 16, Australia 18 In Twickenham, United Kingdom, England ended 2018 with a 37-18 win over Australia on Saturday.
Victory gave England their sixth win in a row over the Wallabies under former Australia boss Eddie Jones.
It also meant they had won three of their four November internationals, with the lone loss an agonising 16-15 defeat to world champions New Zealand.