Altenberg bobsleigh, luge, and skeleton track

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Bobsleigh (foreground) intersecting with men's single luge (background) prior to Turn #1 at the bobsleigh, luge, and skeleton track in Altenberg, Germany.

The Altenberg bobsleigh, luge, and skeleton track is a venue for bobsleigh, luge and skeleton located in Altenberg, Germany.

[edit] History

Altenberg raced bobsleigh as early as 1908 on a natural track going downhill.^[1] By the late 1970s, the East Germans who were already successful in luge, began getting success in bobsleigh. This included a total of six Winter Olympic medals in bobsleigh in 1976 and 1980, along with five world bobsleigh championship medals between 1977 and 1979.^[2][3][4][5] In an effort to increase East Germany's effort to win more bobsleigh and luge medals both at the Winter Olympics and their respective sport's world championships, a track was constructed.^[1] The track at Altenberg was constructed under the order of then-Stasi (Ministry for State Security in East Germany) Minister Erich Mielke.^[1] Construction began in 1981 under restrictive access with a wire fence and armed patrols from the Landstreitkräfte (East German National People's Army) on orders from Mielke.^[1] By 1983, construction was completed though trials were less than successful. This would result in turns 11 and 12 being destroyed and rebuilt. It was not until late 1986 when the track was officially completed with homologation received from both the International Bobsleigh and Tobogganing Federation (FIBT) and the International Luge Federation (FIL) the following year.^[6] The track was part of the training used by SG Dynamo Zinnwald/ SV Dynamo until the 1990 German reunification ^{[7] [8]}. Men's skeleton first competed in 1992. ^[9]In 1997, the women's single luge start house was created before turn three after being shared with the men's double luge start house before turn seven from 1989 to 1996.^[10] Women's skeleton first began competition in 1999 while women's bobsleigh first started the following year.^[11][12] An 18th curve was modified during the summer of 2007 with the addition of a finish curve and straightaway.^[13] The weekend of February 1-3, 2008 had the track hosting the 200th FIL Luge World Cup event that began in December 1977.^[14] The track is a finalist for the 2012 FIL World Luge Championships along with Whistler, British Columbia, Canada with the winner being announced during the 2008 FIL Congress in Calgary, Alberta in June.^[15]

[edit] Track technical details

The track is powered by four refrigeration condensers each with a 200 kW (268 hp) capacity which combined can keep the track frozen at ambient conditions up to 20 deg C (68 deg F). ^[16] Its storage tanks hold up to 45 metric tons (49.5 tons) of ammonia, generating the equivalent of 12,000 household refrigerators.^[16] There a total of fifty sensors located throughout the track with its staff contacted at a moment's notice if anything bad occurs.^[16] Monitoring is done by closed-circuit television to further enhance track security ^[16] The icing of the track starts in October, taking eight workers one week to evenly ice the track to a layer of 2-6 cm (0.79-2.36 in) at a temperature of -13 deg C (9 deg F).^[16]

[edit] Statistics

The venue includes a vertical drop of 122.22 meters from start to finish with a maximum grade of 15% and an average grade of 8.66%

Turns 1-3, 9, 11-14, and 18 have no names listed in the track diagram.^[13] Turn 18 is followed by a a Bremstrecke, a finish straight.

Track records^[17]

Sport	Record	Nation - athlete(s)	Date	Time (seconds)
Bobsleigh two-man	Start	Germany - André Lange & Kevin Kuske	December 20, 2003	5.12
Bobsleigh two-man	Track	Russia - Alexandre Zoubkov & Alexey Voevoda	January 28, 2006	54.64
Bobsleigh four-man	Start	Germany - Christoph Langen, Sven Rühr, Markus Zimmermann, & Olav Hampel	January 12, 1996	5.04
Bobsleigh four-man	Track	Germany - André Lange, René Hoppe, Kevin Kuske, & Martin Putze	February 24, 2008	53.17
Bobsleigh two-woman	Start	Canada - Kaillie Humphries & Shelly-Ann Brown	February 16, 2008	5.77
Bobsleigh two-woman	Track	Germany - Sandra Kiriasis & Berit Wiacker	January 5, 2008	56.84
Men's skeleton	Start	Alexander Tretiakov -  Russia	February 10, 2007	4.90
Men's skeleton	Track	Sebastian Haupt -  Germany	January 4, 2008	57.24
Women's skeleton	Start	Kerstin Jürgens -  Germany	January 8, 2005	5.51
Women's skeleton	Track	Anja Huber -  Germany	January 5, 2008	58.86
Luge - men's singles	Start	Johannes Ludwig -  Germany	February 3, 2008	7.583
Luge - men's singles	Track	Albert Demtschenko -  Russia	November 26, 2005	54.222
Luge - women's singles	Start	Silke Kraushaar -  Germany	November 27, 2005	6.055
Luge - women's singles	Track	Sylke Otto -  Germany	November 27, 2005	53.091
Luge - men's doubles	Start	Germany - Sebastian Schmidt & André Forker	November 27, 2005	6.288
Luge - men's doubles	Track	Germany - Tobias Wendl & Tobias Arlt	February 2, 2008	42.109

[edit] Championships hosted

• FIBT World Championships: 1991 (bobsleigh)^[4], 1994 (men's skeleton)^[18], 2000 (men's bobsleigh)^[4], 2008^[19]
• FIL European Luge Championships: 2002^[20]
• FIL World Luge Championships: 1996^[21]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• FIBT World Championships 2008 official website (Czech), (English), & (German)
• FIBT track profile - Click on video for ride down the track. It will show the bobsleigh-skeleton part intersecting with the men's single luge track prior to turn one, the women's single luge track prior to turn three, and the men's doubles luge track prior to turn seven.
• FIL-Luge track profile
• Official website (German)