World champ Melbardis wins 1st 4-man bobsleigh race of season

World champion Oskars Melbardis of Latvia won a four-man bobsled World Cup race Sunday in Igls, Austria, for his first victory of the season.

After winning the opening heat, driver Melbardis and Daumants Dreiskens, Arvis Vilkaste and Janis Strenga posted the fifth fastest time in the final heat to edge Rico Peter of Switzerland by 0.05 seconds. Steven Holcomb of the United States was one hundredth further behind in third.

Justin Kripps piloted the top Canadian sled of Alex Kopacz, Jesse Lumsden and Ben Coakwell to a seventh-place finish, 0.24 seconds behind the winners.

Justin Kripps navigates 4-man crew to 7th-place finish in Igls

8 years ago

Duration 2:30

The Canadian foursome finished seventh on Sunday in Germany with a time of 1:42.25, +0.24 seconds back.

"It's really nice to be in the races again," Kripps said in a press release. "We still need to work on the starts, but everything is starting to come together now at the right time."

Chris Spring's team of Cameron Stones, Joshua Kirkpatrick and Neville Wright finished 16th in a time of 1:42.57.

There were three all-women sleds in the field, including two Canadian teams. Calgary's Kaillie Humphries led her sled to a 29th-place finish while Edmonton's Alysia Rissling was 30th.

World Cup leader Alexander Kasjanov of Russia finished 0.34 behind in ninth after one of his pushers slipped and struggled to get into the sled after the start to their final run.

Johannes Lochner of Germany, who was second in the standings, was disqualified before the opening heat because the runners of his sled were too warm.