From Beijing, CHN
(February 18, 2022) – Laura Nolte wasn’t perfect in her first run of two-woman bobsled, but she didn’t need to be. After two runs on track in Yanqing the German holds a .5 second lead over the field.
On the first run Nolte hit the wall entering Curve 9, and followed that with a large skid into the curve, similar to her trouble in the monobob race a few days earlier. However this time she was still quicker than the field. On the second run, Nolte and brakewoman Deborah Levi were one of the few teams to improve their start time, and Nolte had a cleaner run to break her own track record as they slid into the lead by .5 over teammate Mariama Jamanka.
While she wasn’t necessarily surprised by her great start, Nolte had some doubts after a tough monobob race earlier in the week.
“I knew it could happen,” she said. “But I also thought in monobob that it could happen because I also had some good training runs in monobob.”
Jamanka, pushed by Alexandra Burghardt, was also a little sloppy in her two drives but held off the remainder of the field to gain hold of second place by .24 over the United States.
Meyers Taylor, the monobob silver medalist, and Sylvia Hoffman set the start record in the first heat, then tied it in the second to put themselves solidly in medal contention, .74 behind Nolte but within a quarter of a second of Jamanka.
For Meyers Taylor, her final two runs in China will be about enjoying herself.
“I’m just going to go out there and have fun tomorrow,” she told reporters after her second run. “It’s been a long journey and I’m just going to enjoy the heck out of it. I feel really good right now, I’m just going to go get some rest and get after it tomorrow.”
Canada’s Christine de Bruin and Kristen Bujnowski jumped up from fifth to fourth, but may need some help from the top three to move into the medals. They find themselves sandwiched between the two American teams, with Kaillie Humphries and Kaysha Love just behind in fifth after a tough second run set them back from fourth.
Germany’s Kim Kalicki and Lisa Buckwitz, expected to contend for medals, never quite found their groove on their first day of sliding and finished the day in sixth place. Buckwitz, the gold medal winning brakewoman from 2018, had spent the bulk of her 2021/2022 season as a pilot, but moved back to brakes for Kalicki halfway through the World Cup season.
Melanie Hasler has put Switzerland well into the top ten with a seventh place effort. She and Nadja Pasternack had two quick pushes coupled with Hasler putting down two of her better drives of the season to stay just behind Kalicki.
Canada has two sleds in the top ten overnight. Cynthia Appiah and Dawn Richardson-Wilson had two strong starts coupled with clean driving by Appiah to finish the day in eighth place, but with a realistic chance to move up into the top six. Teammates Melissa Lotholz and Sara Villani jumped from 18th to 16th in their second run.
Appiah was happy with her two-woman effort.
“It’s a marked improvement from the monobob,” she said after her second run. “I was just telling myself to have fun and I was getting the training runs that I expected of myself. I just tried to manifest that in the race today.”
Great Britain’s Mica McNeill finished the day in 19th.
“It’s not what we were putting together in training,” McNeill said about her first day of sliding. “Nothing drastically has gone wrong. It just hasn’t all come together.”
Russia’s Nadezhda Sergeeva was the big mover of the second heat. She came into the second heat in 16th place, but threw down the eighth quickest run of the second heat to move up to ninth place.
The final two runs of two-woman bobsled will take place on Saturday, February 19 at 8:00 PM local time, 7:00 AM EST.
Results After Two Runs:
| Pos | Names | Nation | Bib | IBSF Rank | Start 1 | Start 2 | Run 1 | Run 2 | Total |
| 1 | Nolte / Levi | GER | 4 | 2 | 5.36 | 5.35 | 61.04 | 61.01 | 2:02.05 |
| 2 | Jamanka / Burghardt | GER | 9 | 6 | 5.35 | 5.40 | 61.10 | 61.45 | 2:02.55 |
| 3 | Meyers Taylor / Hoffman | USA | 8 | 1 | 5.33 | 5.33 | 61.26 | 61.53 | 2:02.79 |
| 4 | de Bruin / Bujnowski | CAN | 6 | 4 | 5.43 | 5.45 | 61.45 | 61.76 | 2:03.21 |
| 5 | Humphries / Love | USA | 7 | 5 | 5.37 | 5.43 | 61.41 | 61.97 | 2:03.38 |
| 6 | Kalicki / Buckwitz | GER | 5 | 3 | 5.42 | 5.44 | 61.61 | 61.78 | 2:03.39 |
| 7 | Hasler / Pasternack | SUI | 11 | 14 | 5.42 | 5.41 | 61.65 | 61.85 | 2:03.50 |
| 8 | Appiah / Richarson Wilson | CAN | 13 | 16 | 5.38 | 5.42 | 61.75 | 61.89 | 2:03.64 |
| 9 | Sergeeva / Belomestnykh | ROC | 10 | 7 | 5.42 | 5.47 | 62.04 | 61.90 | 2:03.94 |
| 10 | Beierl / Onasanya | AUT | 16 | 18 | 5.36 | 5.48 | 61.91 | 62.12 | 2:04.03 |
| 11 | Huai / Wang | CHN | 1 | 12 | 5.47 | 5.49 | 61.88 | 62.17 | 2:04.05 |
| 12 | Walker / Reddingus | AUS | 19 | 24 | 5.47 | 5.49 | 61.98 | 62.11 | 2:04.09 |
| 13 | Ying / Du | CHN | 15 | 8 | 5.52 | 5.54 | 61.92 | 62.19 | 2:04.11 |
| 14 | Makarova / Mamedova | ROC | 2 | 9 | 5.49 | 5.54 | 61.83 | 62.29 | 2:04.12 |
| 15 | Vannieuwenhuyse / Aerts | BEL | 20 | 25 | 5.55 | 5.58 | 62.08 | 62.12 | 2:04.20 |
| 16 | Lotholz / Villani | CAN | 12 | 15 | 5.41 | 5.43 | 62.12 | 62.09 | 2:04.21 |
| 17 | Boch / Senechal | FRA | 3 | 27 | 5.57 | 5.59 | 61.90 | 62.32 | 2:04.22 |
| 18 | Grecu / Wick | ROU | 14 | 10 | 5.52 | 5.53 | 61.82 | 62.47 | 2:04.29 |
| 19 | McNeill / Douglas | GBR | 18 | 20 | 5.53 | 5.56 | 62.19 | 62.35 | 2:04.54 |
| 20 | Fontanive / Strebel | SUI | 17 | 17 | 5.58 | 5.61 | 62.48 | 62.35 | 2:04.83 |
