From Cortina d’Ampezzo, ITA
(February 21, 2026) – Once again, Johannes Lochner holds a sizable lead over Francesco Friedrich in the 2026 Olympic Winter Games. This time it’s in the four-man bobsled race, and while the overnight lead is just over half of what it was in two-man, it’s still going to be a large mountain to climb for the two-time defending Olympic champion.
Lochner was the first off, and his team of Thorsten Margis, Jorn Wenzel and Georg Fleischhauer lowered the start record to a 4.73, with Lochner putting down a new track record 53.91 downtime.
Friedrich was next and slid into what would be second place, but .39 back behind Lochner.
As the field filled in behind the two Germans, Great Britain’s Brad Hall slid to third, Switzerland’s Cedric Follador fourth and Adam Ammour fifth.
In the second heat and on a slowing track, Ammour threw down what would be the quickest run of the heat to take the lead. He held that lead as neither Follador or Hall could match his time.
Eventually, Friedrich set the start record in the heat and put down a quick and clean run that was just five hundredths slower than Ammour’s second heat time to take a lead by .16 with Lochner still to come.
Lochner wasn’t perfect in his second run, but he didn’t need to be. His second start was six hundredths slower than Friedrich’s start record, but his slide was better as he opened up another .04 on his teammate to take a .43 lead overnight, with teammates Friedrich and Ammour second and third.
“Our first run was brutally good,” Lochner said after the second heat. “I had more problems in training than I had hoped for, but we always kept up with the field, so I knew that if we could manage it at the top, we would be really fast. But I didn’t expect such a big lead.”
Michael Vogt put down a quick second run to move up from sixth to fourth, with Patrick Baumgartner and Follador fifth and sixth.
Hall slid into seventh place, with USA’s Kris Horn ninth overnight. Teammate Frank Del Duca moved up from 14th to 12th in the second heat, two spots ahead of Canada’s Taylor Austin in 14th. Jay Dearborn rounded out the Canadian effort in 19th, up from 22nd.
Edson Bindilatti will enter the second day of sliding in a dead heat with Martin Kranz for 20th. Jamaica’s Shane Pitter is 22nd, only .11 out of a fourth and final run.
Romain Heinrich, Axel Brown, and Jakob Mandlbauer all crashed in their second heat runs. Heinrich and Brown’s entire teams were okay, Mandlbauer was taken to a nearby medical facility for routine further examination.
Standings After Two Heats:
| Pos | Names | Nation | Bib | Start 1 | Start 2 | Run 1 | Run 2 | Total |
| 1 | Lochner / Margis / Wenzel / Fleischhauer | GER | 1 | 4.73 | 4.77 | 53.91 | 54.70 | 1:48l.61 |
| 2 | Friedrich / Sommer / Schüller / Straub | GER | 2 | 4.73 | 4.71 | 54.30 | 54.74 | 1:49.04 |
| 3 | Ammour / Ammour / Tasche / Schaller | GER | 3 | 4.78 | 4.79 | 54.51 | 54.69 | 1:49.20 |
| 4 | Vogt / Haas / Ndiaye / Aeberhard | SUI | 7 | 4.80 | 4.81 | 54.53 | 54.79 | 1:49.32 |
| 5 | Baumgartner / Bilotti / Fantazzini / Mircea | ITA | 6 | 4.84 | 4.80 | 54.55 | 54.84 | 1:49.39 |
| 6 | Follador / Rolli / Annen / Vogele | SUI | 8 | 4.86 | 4.86 | 54.49 | 54.91 | 1:49.40 |
| 7 | Hall / Cacket / Greenwood / Lawrence | GBR | 4 | 4.78 | 4.78 | 54.39 | 55.04 | 1:49.43 |
| 8 | Kim / Kim / Lee / Kim | KOR | 9 | 4.79 | 4.76 | 54.60 | 54.90 | 1:49.50 |
| 9 | Horn / Furnell / Powell / Vissering | USA | 11 | 4.76 | 4.74 | 54.60 | 55.01 | 1:49.61 |
| 10 | Treichl / Sammer / Stepan / Huber | AUT | 5 | 4.76 | 4.77 | 54.80 | 54.90 | 1:49.70 |
| 11 | Kalenda / Kaufmanis / Miknis / Klava | LAT | 13 | 4.82 | 4.81 | 54.64 | 55.23 | 1:49.87 |
| 12 | Del Duca, Niederhofer / Sosoo / Williamson | USA | 27 | 4.86 | 4.83 | 55.03 | 54.99 | 1:50.02 |
| 13 | Wesselink / Franjic / Franjic / Koster | NED | 18 | 4.80 | 4.79 | 55.09 | 55.00 | 1:50.09 |
| 14 | Austin / Bruggeling / Evelyn / Murray-Lawrence | CAN | 10 | 4.84 | 4.83 | 54.72 | 55.42 | 1:50.14 |
| 15 | Rohner / Moser / Hersperger / Geiri | SUI | 15 | 4.91 | 4.91 | 54.99 | 55.16 | 1:50.15 |
| 16 | Tentea / Pacioianu / Iordache / Dinescu | ROU | 24 | 4.92 | 4.94 | 55.05 | 55.12 | 1:50.17 |
| 17 | Sun / Zhang / Shi / An | CHN | 25 | 4.81 | 4.83 | 55.05 | 55.21 | 1:50.26 |
| 18 | Li / Jiang / Ye / Ding | CHN | 22 | 4.88 | 4.87 | 55.07 | 55.36 | 1:50.43 |
| 19 | Dearborn / Eskrick-Parkinson / Stoikos / Zanette | CAN | 14 | 4.82 | 5.79 | 55.18 | 55.27 | 1:50.45 |
| 20 | Kranz / Buehler / Lenherr / Tschofen | LIE | 16 | 5.01 | 4.98 | 55.08 | 55.38 | 1:50.46 |
| 20 | Bindilatti / de Souza / Souza da Silva / Bacca Goncalves | BRA | 17 | 4.92 | 4.93 | 55.04 | 55.42 | 1:50.46 |
| 22 | Pitter / Harris / Tracey / Fearon | JAM | 19 | 4.81 | 4.80 | 55.28 | 55.29 | 1:50.57 |
| 23 | Suk / Chae / Chun / Lee | KOR | 20 | 4.92 | 4.90 | 55.51 | 55.22 | 1:50.73 |
| 24 | Edelman / Chen / Zisman / Katz | ISR | 21 | 5.04 | 5.03 | 55.53 | 55.63 | 1:51.16 |
| DNF | Mandlbauer / Bertschler / Mitterer / Nichols-Bardi | AUT | 26 | 4.86 | 5.84 | 55.14 | DNF | |
| DNF | Heinrcih / Hauterville / Blairon / Riou | FRA | 12 | 4.81 | 4.84 | 55.59 | DNF | |
| DNF | Brown / John / John / Williams | TTO | 23 | 4.95 | 4.98 | 55.72 | DNF |