Schulte Wins Altenberg World Champs Gold

From Altenberg, GER

(January 28, 2024) – Lisa Schulte continued an outstanding FIL World Championship for Austria with a gold medal in the women’s singles event.

After one heat, Schulte led the two women who have been battling for World Cup gold medals over the past few seasons, with Germany’s Julia Taubitz in second and Austrian teammate Madeleine Egle in third. Behind them, Latvia’s Elina Vitola was looking to get onto the podium from fourth place.

Vitola took the lead from Merle Fräbel in the second heat with the top three to go. Egle was next, and slid into the lead by over a tenth. From there, Julia Taubitz took over but her second effort wasn’t quite the perfection you’d expect from Taubitz in Altenberg.

Schulte sat at the top of the track in Germany as the last slider to start, a position she’s rarely found herself in. The Austrian showed poise from the moment she started her second run, first keeping pace with the German champion and then pulling away as the Austrian won by .104 over Taubitz for gold, with Taubitz winning silver and Egle bronze.

Vitola continued an impressive weekend for Latvia with a fourth place finish.

The gold medal for Schulte was also her first career senior level two-heat gold. She’d previously won a handful of Nation’s Cup events, but never anything on Saturday or Sunday.

Merle Fräbel finished her first world championship race with a fifth place finish and a new track record, bettering the time that had been set about two minutes before her run by Latvia’s Kendija Aparjode, who finished sixth.

Summer Britcher was the top North American in the field with an eighth place finish. Her second effort just had a small foot-tap and that dropped her one spot, finishing just behind Sprint World Championship silver medalist Natalie Maag.

Ashley Farquarson had a skiddy first run but cleaned things up in the second to finish 19th. Emily Sweeney finished a forgettable FIL World Championships with two bumpy runs and a 20th place finish.

While they didn’t have anyone in the top ten, Canada outslid their expectations in Altenberg. Caitlin Nash finished 13th, one spot ahead of teammate Trinity Ellis. Ellis had a top ten run in the first heat from the 36th and final starting spot, but couldn’t match that effort in her second run but finished 14th.

Embyr-Lee Susko, the youngest Canadian in the field, finished 16th in her first FIL World Championship.

Argentina’s Veronica Ravenna finished 23rd, one spot ahead of Olympic silver medalist Anna Berreiter of Germany. Ireland’s Elsa Desmond finished 34th.

Results: