From Deutschnofen, ITA
(February 23, 2025) – Across the bulk of the 2024/2025 FIL World Cup season, the men’s singles on natural track has been the tightest racing on tour. Week in and week out, races have been decided by hundredths of a second.
Well that was not the case on Sunday. The World Cup points had effectively come down to a race-off, with Italy’s Florian Clara trailing reigning world champion Michael Scheikl of Austria by just five points. Whoever was ahead after two runs in Deutschnofen would be the World Cup winner; Sheikl for the second time and Clara for the first time in singles.
Clara and Sheikl were the final two men off the top in the first heat, and the advantage went to Clara. From the 24th starting spot, Clara took the lead, and then held it was Sheikl could only get within .54 of Clara in third
Between the two championship contenders, Fabian Brunner sat second, while Clara’s longtime partner in doubles Patrick Pigneter was in fourth, only .09 behind Sheikl.
Of the four, Pigneter was first off the top in Heat 2. The three-time singles world champion put down a clean run to take the lead from Hannes Unterholzner. He held that lead as Scheikl, needing a quick run, fell behind by just .02.
Brunner was next, and had the second best first split of the heat and once again had what would be the second fastest run of the heat to take the lead with Clara to go.
Clara, who had not won in men’s singles until this season, set the quick start of the heat yet again, and put down the quickest run of the heat on his way to a yawning .64 second victory over Brunner, with Pigneter completing the sweep.
The win for Clara was his fourth of his career, all this season.
“I wasn’t nervous at all before the race,” Clara told FIL media after the race. “After the first run I knew I wouldn’t let it slip away!”
Brunner’s silver was the best finish of his season.
For Pigneter, he finished bronze in his final race. In the discussion of the greatest luge athlete of all time, Pigneter ends his career with 12 World Cup titles, 54 World Cup victories, and 3 world championship titles just in men’s singles. Those accolades pair with 13 overall titles, 68 World Cup gold medals and five world championships alongside Florian Clara in doubles.
Sheikl was unable to keep it close with Clara and finished fourth.
“It’s always disappointing to lose the overall title in the final race,” Sheikl said. “But retiring as world champion is a great consolation”.
Unterholzner was fifth in the race, with Stefan Federer sixth.
The United States had most of their team go home after the penultimate race of the season, but Leonard Pizziola stuck around and finished 20th.
Clara took the season title, 35 points ahead of Michael Sheikl. Stefan Federer was third, 18 points ahead of Fabian Brunner in fourth, with Alex Oberhofer fifth.
Results:
| Pos | Name | Nation | Bib | Start 1 | Start 2 | Run 1 | Run 2 | Total |
| 1 | Florian Clara | ITA | 24 | 16.33 | 16.35 | 54.89 | 55.56 | 1:50.45 |
| 2 | Fabian Brunner | ITA | 20 | 16.53 | 16.51 | 55.26 | 55.83 | 1:51.09 |
| 3 | Patrick Pigneter | ITA | 19 | 16.50 | 16.53 | 55.83 | 55.52 | 1:51.35 |
| 4 | Michael Scheikl | AUT | 25 | 16.44 | 16.58 | 55.43 | 56.02 | 1:51.45 |
| 5 | Hannes Unterholzner | ITA | 2 | 16.45 | 16.64 | 55.58 | 56.41 | 1:51.99 |
| 6 | Stefan Federer | SUI | 22 | 16.41 | 16.70 | 55.62 | 56.52 | 1:52.14 |
| 7 | Fabian Achenrainer | AUT | 21 | 16.70 | 16.82 | 56.00 | 56.22 | 1:52.22 |
| 8 | Vid Kralj | SLO | 17 | 16.61 | 16.57 | 56.07 | 56.58 | 1:52.65 |
| 9 | Samuel Halcin | SVK | 14 | 16.79 | 16.66 | 56.24 | 56.65 | 1:52.89 |
| 10 | Florian Markt | AUT | 10 | 16.69 | 16.89 | 56.32 | 56.66 | 1:52.98 |
| 11 | Ziga Kralj | SLO | 18 | 16.68 | 16.84 | 56.35 | 56.96 | 1:53.31 |
| 12 | Sebastian Feldhammer | AUT | 16 | 16.65 | 16.78 | 56.40 | 57.40 | 1:53.80 |
| 13 | Vincent Streit | GER | 7 | 17.12 | 17.18 | 57.39 | 57.73 | 1:55.12 |
| 14 | Gabriel Halcin | SVK | 13 | 17.18 | 16.83 | 58.14 | 57.72 | 1:55.86 |
| 15 | Jerome Almer | SUI | 12 | 17.39 | 17.46 | 58.61 | 58.47 | 1:57.08 |
| 16 | Coskun Ercoskun | FIN | 9 | 17.40 | 17.48 | 58.58 | 59.17 | 1:57.75 |
| 17 | Peter Neupauer | SVK | 11 | 17.18 | 17.39 | 59.16 | 59.18 | 1:58.34 |
| 18 | Marco Almer | SUI | 1 | 17.38 | 18.24 | 59.10 | 60.54 | 1:59.64 |
| 19 | Dominik Neupauer | SVK | 6 | 17.48 | 17.98 | 60.49 | 60.82 | 2:01.31 |
| 20 | Leonard Pizziola | USA | 5 | 18.47 | 18.43 | 63.95 | 63.65 | 2:07.60 |
| 21 | Shohei Tanaka | SUI | 3 | 19.15 | 18.74 | 63.59 | 93.44 | 2:37.03 |
| 22 | Alex Oberhofer | ITA | 23 | 16.52 | 55.64 | |||
| 23 | Daniel Gruber | ITA | 15 | 16.58 | 56.02 | |||
| 24 | Florian Freigassner | AUT | 8 | 17.22 | 58.21 | |||
| 25 | Leon Auer | AUT | 4 | 16.85 | 58.32 |