Officials Make Changes To Olympic Luge Track But Deny It Was Too Fast

Officials are defending the Olympic luge track, saying they went through a long and safe process in preparing it for the Vancouver Games.

Tim Gayda, VANOC’s vice-president of sport, says it’s a fast track, but measures were taken to make sure athletes were confident about racing on it.

He made his comments one day after a 21-year-old Georgian luger died when he lost control of his sled on the final turn of a training run.

Concerns about the lightning-fast course at the Whistler Sliding Centre had been raised for months. But officials defended it in the wake of Nodar Kumaritashvili’s death.

“It is one of the fastest tracks but we never said that it is too fast,” Josef Fendt, president of the International Luge Federation (FIL), said through an interpreter at a news conference Saturday.

Still, changes have been made on the final turn and the lugers will now start further down the course to reduce their speeds. The competition opened with the men’s singles Saturday.

FIL secretary-general Svein Romstad said the entire luge world was in mourning.

“They lost a friend yesterday, it is emotional for everybody,” he said, struggling to control his emotions.

Kumaritashvili was travelling at nearly 145 km/h when he flew off his sled and was hurled into an unpadded steel support pole during Friday’s training session.

Gayda said the track had lived up to – and surpassed – its obligations to make the course available to foreign athletes.

“We’re quite confident in the number of runs we did provide all the teams,” he said.

Romstad noted the track had been open more than two years with some 5,000 runs and that “for lack of a better word” crash ratio “is on par with other tracks.”

Officials delayed the reopening of the Whistler track Saturday and scheduled the men to start further down the track at the women’s start. They will likely lower the start for the women as well.

Officials also have modified the final curve where he crashed, erecting a wooden wall over the steel beams.

Romstad said the Georgian lost control coming out of a turn and the G-force “literally collapsed his body, rendering it difficult to control the sled.

“Once this happened, he was literally at the mercy of the path of the sled.”

Romstad called the young Georgian a “good athlete,” with 26 runs on the Whistler track.

“This is a large number of runs for an athlete of his character.”

He had competed in five World Cup events this season, ranking 44th.

“For me personally and for the International Luge Federation, yesterday was the worst day, it was the saddest day…,” said Fendt. “We have been competing since ’64, so almost 50 years and it was the worst event that happened.”

Fendt said the last fatality on an artificial track was Dec. 10, 1975 when an Italian luger died

Georgian Luger Nodar Kumaritashvili Dies After Training Run Accident

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