U.S. bobsledders end 46-year drought

Associated Press

The drought is over! The drought is over!

Todd Hays and Brian Shimer ended nearly a half-century of Olympic frustration for the U.S. men’s bobsled team, driving to the silver and bronze medals in the four-man race Saturday.

“That was amazing!” Hays shouted. “We’ve got a 46-year monkey off our back. I can’t think of a better way for it to end. Two medals. If I hear 46 years again, I think I’m going to pass out.”

The gold went to Olympic rookie Andre Lange and Germany-2, which finished the four heats in 3 minutes, 7.51 seconds.

Hays, with Randy Jones, Bill Schuffenhauer and brakeman Garrett Hines behind him, drove his fire-engine red USA-1 sled to second in 3:07.81 before a boisterous crowd of 15,000, who believed that Utah Olympic Park had become a magic mountain.

Hays barely held off Shimer, who staged a stunning rally to win his first medal in his last Olympic race. Shimer, who had Mike Kohn, Doug Sharp and brakeman Dan Steele with him, won bronze in 3:07.86, sliding past World Cup champion Martin Annen of Switzerland on the final run.

When it was all over, Shimer burst into tears, just as he had promised.

“I’ve been in this sport 16 years,” he said. “I did it on my last run in my last Olympics. This is a fairy-tale ending. Who doesn’t like that?”

It also was a special moment for the other Americans.

Hines and Jones became the first black U.S. men to win medals in the Winter Olympics. And Schuffenhauer won silver after replacing Pavle Jovanovic, who was suspended for two years just days before the games for failing a drug test.

The medals came five days after Jill Bakken and Vonetta Flowers won the inaugural women’s bobsled race for the United States. Flowers was the first black athlete to win a Winter Olympic gold medal.

The U.S. men’s team, a powerhouse in the sport in its early days, had not won an Olympic bobsled medal since Arthur Tyler and his teammates took the four-man bronze at the 1956 Cortina Games. The United States had not won two medals in the same bobsled race since the 1948 St. Moritz Games.

At these games, the Americans had won gold in the three previous races on the 15-curve canyon course at Bear Hollow: women’s bobsled and men’s and women’s skeleton.

When Hays jumped into the lead after the first two runs Friday, everybody sensed another.

He had the fastest time on each of those heats but had declined to speak afterward, preferring to concentrate on the race. He held a slim .09 of a second lead over Annen and Lange, who were tied for second.

It was much warmer on Saturday – 44 degrees and slightly windy at the start of the third heat – and that slowed the times. Hays was first to slide, and when he matched his start time from the second run as scores of fans yelled and waved American flags, he appeared set to extend his lead.

But his finish time was 47.22 seconds, more than a half-second slower than the previous heat, and the gold had slipped away just like that. Lange made up .38 with the fastest third run.

With a medal in reach for the first time in so many years, Hays and Shimer came back strong with the fastest times of the final heat to make the podium. They celebrated wildly at the finish line when Annen fell to fourth, hugging each other in disbelief.

“It was like watching someone resuscitate someone from a heart attack,” Jones said. “It’s been up and down, up and down, an emotional roller-coaster.”

Cross-country skiing

Third gold for Muehlegg: Johann Muehlegg, a German who became a Spanish citizen in 1999, won his third gold medal of the games in the 50-kilometer classical race.

“Now I am feeling very tired,” Muehlegg said. “I’m not sure if I will be able to celebrate these gold medals.”

Muehlegg – known as “Juanito” in his adopted country – switched affiliations after a 1999 falling out with the German ski federation. He emerged as the dominant skier at the Soldier Hollow course in these Olympics.

Russian Mikhail Ivanov won the silver, while Estonia’s Andrus Veerpalu took the bronze.

Muehlegg earlier won gold in the 30K freestyle and 10K pursuit. Only Norway’s Ole Einar Bjoerndalen, with four golds, and Croatia’s Janica Kostelic, with three, have done as well as Muehlegg.

Long-track speedskating

German joins elite company: Two-time defending gold medalist Claudia Pechstein of Germany, in a world record performance, took the gold in the women’s 5,000 meters.

It was her second gold of the games, and made her just the second speedskater ever to win three consecutive Olympic titles. American Bonnie Blair won the 500 in 1988, ‘92 and ‘94.

Pechstein, 30, has seven career Olympic medals, including four golds.