From Lillehammer, NOR
(February 15, 2025) – The 2024/2025 IBSF World Cup season had seen its share of close racing, with multiple ties for gold over the course of the calendar. So it made sense that the final two-man race of the season once again was down to the hundredth of a second.
Johannes Lochner and Georg Fleischhauer set the quick start time of the first heat, and Lochner drove them to a .01 second advantage over Francesco Friedrich and Felix Straub, who were .01 slower off the top.
In the second heat, Friedrich and Straub lowered their start time by .02 for what was for the moment the quick push of the race. Friedrich’s second drive, like most everyone else in the heat, was a bit slower but more than enough to take the lead ahead of teammate Adam Ammour.
Lochner and Fleischhauer answered. They lowered their start by .03, giving them a .03 second lead at the start. Lochner came back to Friedrich early in the second run, and it was a near dead heat most of the way down the 1994 Olympic track. But Lochner pulled away at the end of his run to win by just .02 over Friedrich, with Ammour .2 back in third.
Lochner’s win was his fourth two-man victory on the season and 19th World Cup gold of his career. Friedrich’s silver was medal number 85 in his two-man career.
Ammour and brakeman Nick Stadelmann had the third quickest run in both heats on their way to a bronze medal, Ammour’s fourth of the season.
Switzerland’s Michael Vogt and Andreas Haas were fourth, up from fifth in the first heat as they picked off Great Britain’s Brad Hall and Taylor Lawrence, who were fifth.
Cedric Follador and Luca Rolli rounded out the top six in eighth place.
Canada’s Taylor Austin and Mark Zanette were 13th, one spot ahead of Pat Norton and Mike Evelyn. Cyrus Gray and Shaq Murray-Lawrence were 20th in Gray’s first World Cup start as a pilot.
Great Britain’s Adam Baird and Jens Hullah were 16th.
Francesco Friedrich won the two-man World Cup title by just 15 points over Johannes Lochner. Brad Hall finished third overall, well ahead of Adam Ammour in fourth. Patrick Baumgartner rounded out the top five.
Results:
| Pos | Names | Nation | Bib | Start 1 | Start 2 | Run 1 | Run 2 | Total |
| 1 | Lochner / Fleischhauer | GER | 7 | 4.98 | 4.95 | 50.45 | 50.54 | 1:40.99 |
| 2 | Friedrich / Straub | GER | 12 | 4.99 | 4.97 | 50.46 | 50.55 | 1:41.01 |
| 3 | Ammour / Stadelmann | GER | 9 | 5.02 | 4.99 | 50.54 | 50.65 | 1:41.19 |
| 4 | Vogt / Haas | SUI | 14 | 5.12 | 5.12 | 50.67 | 50.83 | 1:41.50 |
| 5 | Hall / Lawrence | GBR | 6 | 5.02 | 5.04 | 50.65 | 50.96 | 1:41.61 |
| 6 | Follador / Rolli | SUI | 13 | 5.16 | 5.20 | 51.01 | 51.12 | 1:42.13 |
| 7 | Rohner / Hersperger | SUI | 11 | 5.11 | 5.13 | 51.04 | 51.10 | 1:42.14 |
| 8 | Kim / Chun | KOR | 5 | 5.04 | 5.08 | 50.92 | 51.25 | 1:42.17 |
| 9 | Baumgartner / Mircea | ITA | 10 | 5.17 | 5.14 | 51.10 | 51.13 | 1:42.23 |
| 10 | Kalenda / Miknis | LAT | 4 | 5.07 | 5.04 | 51.06 | 51.18 | 1:42.24 |
| 10 | Vain / Riou | MON | 3 | 5.10 | 5.11 | 50.91 | 51.33 | 1:42.24 |
| 12 | Heinrich / Blairon | FRA | 19 | 5.12 | 5.11 | 51.17 | 51.19 | 1:42.36 |
| 13 | Austin / Zanette | CAN | 2 | 5.26 | 5.24 | 51.26 | 51.40 | 1:42.66 |
| 14 | Norton / Evelyn | CAN | 1 | 5.15 | 5.20 | 51.20 | 51.53 | 1:42.73 |
| 15 | Sun / Ye | CHN | 15 | 5.18 | 5.14 | 51.26 | 51.51 | 1:42.77 |
| 16 | Baird / Hullah | GBR | 16 | 5.21 | 5.20 | 51.44 | 51.53 | 1:42.97 |
| 17 | Li / Shi | CHN | 8 | 5.18 | 5.19 | 51.45 | 51.55 | 1:43.00 |
| 18 | Kranz / Tschofen | LIE | 17 | 5.29 | 5.31 | 51.64 | 51.65 | 1:43.29 |
| 19 | Brown / Harris | TTO | 18 | 5.22 | 5.21 | 51.73 | 51.59 | 1:43.32 |
| 20 | Gray / Murray-Lawrence | CAN | 21 | 5.08 | 5.14 | 51.70 | 52.13 | 1:43.83 |
| 21 | Edelman / Kirejevs | ISR | 20 | 5.23 | 51.83 |