Contact: Amanda Bird, USBSF Marketing & Communications Director
(518) 354-2250, abird@usbsf.com

U.S. claims bronze in team event

IGLS, Austria (Jan. 19, 2013)- The U.S. banked bronze in the Igls team event today. Athletes in women’s skeleton, men’s skeleton, women’s bobsled and men’s two-man bobsled took one run each, and the nation with the lowest four-heat combined time was declared the winner.  Katie Uhlaender (Breckenridge, Colo.) threw down the second fastest time of the women’s skeleton heat to put Team USA in medal position.

“It’s great,” Uhlaender said.  “I had some things I needed to fix after yesterday’s race, and I had a great team behind me today.  This is a fun event.”

Men’s skeleton competitor Matt Antoine (Prairie du Chien, Wisc.) was the first athlete to descend the course and he started the clock for Team USA with a run of 54.34 seconds.  Elana Meyers (Douglasville, Ga.) teamed with Lolo Jones (Des Moines, Iowa) in the Under Armour sled for the third best time in the women’s bobsled heat, and Uhlaender clocked a run of 55.28 seconds to bump the team into medal position.  Steven Holcomb (Park City, Utah) took the BMW prototype sled for another competitive run and clocked the fastest speed down the track with brakeman Nic Taylor (Hayward, Calif.).  Team USA earned bronze with a combined time of 3:37.34.

“I like this,” Jones said in a broadcast interview before awards.  “There’s a good similarity between this and a track and field event, so it’s cool.”

GER-1 claimed gold with a total time of 3:36.15.  Three of the four runs by the Germans were fastest of their heats.  Sarah Reid led CAN-1 with a speedy women’s skeleton run to help the squad earn silver with a cumulative time of 3:36.95.

The Igls World Cup concludes tomorrow with the four-man bobsled World Cup race at 10 a.m. local time/ 4 a.m. ET.

Please contact Amanda Bird, USBSF Marketing & Communications Director, at abird@usbsf.com or 518-354-2250 with media inquiries.

Results:

1. Rommel, Kiriasis/Tischer, Huber, Friedrich/Gerhardi (GER) 3:36.15 (53.48, 54.63, 55.58, 52.87); 2. Fairburn, Humphries/Baadsvik, Reid, Rush/Lumsden (CAN) 3:36.95 (54.19, 54.44, 55.20, 53.12); 3. Antoine, Meyers/Jones, Uhlaender, Holcomb/Taylor (USA) 3:37.34 (54.34, 54.55, 55.28, 53.17);

About the U.S. Bobsled and Skeleton Federation
The United States Bobsled and Skeleton Federation, based in Lake Placid, N.Y., is the national governing body for the sports of bobsled and skeleton in the United States. The USBSF would like to thank its sponsors, suppliers and contributors for their support: BMW of North America, Under Armour, United States National Guard, Kampgrounds of America, WIDIA, Vivat!, Global Forwarding, KBC Helmets, Azad Watches, Latta USA, Susan G. Komen for the Cure, Autism Speaks, Park City Lodging, EDAS/Ripxx, UberSense, Tesa Tape and Ferris Mfg. Corp. For more information, please visit the USBSF website at http://bobsled.teamusa.org.

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