Walker’s winter wonderland: Aussie sleighs ’em again
Ian Chadband |
Bree Walker is set for a white Christmas celebration with her family, content in the knowledge that she goes into the festive break looking like the monobob sledder to beat for gold at next year’s Winter Olympics.
Australia’s converted one-lap hurdler sealed back-to-back World Cup triumphs in Latvia on Saturday, seven days after she’d triumphed in a record-breaking run on her favourite Lillehammer track in Norway.
The 33-year-old reckoned it felt “amazing” to this time prevail in Sigulda on the last World Cup stop before the winter break, as she outpaced Germany’s double world champion Laura Nolte by just 0.11 seconds over the two runs to lift the fifth global gold of her career.
Hitting a peak speed of 114km/h, Walker still lay only fourth fastest in the field after her first run.
But she then produced the quickest second-run time of any of the 21 competitors as she ended the year with the perfect Christmas present before she turns all her focus on striking gold in the Milan-Cortina Games in mid-February.
“You just have to go for it. I knew I made a few mistakes at the top in the first heat, so I knew I could win if I cleaned it up through the labyrinth area, so I was like, ‘all right, just go for it’ — and I just gave it everything I had,” Walker said.
“It’s a crazy track. It gets me real fired up, though. I knew when I came down from that run, that I had a shot for the medals, and to be standing here with gold again this week is amazing. Feeling on top of the world to finish 2025 with another win.”
The jet-setting Walker, who’s so well travelled she reckons she doesn’t really have a location she call ‘home’ any more, now gets a 10-day break over the Christmas period back at her Canadian training base in Calgary.
“I’ll see my parents there. I haven’t seen them since April,” she said.
“They’ve flown all the way over from Australia to spend Christmas with me, gonna have some downtime with them for their first white Christmas — a big change from Cairns to minus-20 degrees in Calgary — so very excited to be with them and just to be filled with all the good feels.”
Those good feels include her moving right on to the heels of overall monobob World Cup leader Nolte, now just three points behind on 842 points to the German’s 845.
After four of the season’s seven races, it’s increasingly looking like a two-pilot race for the crown between the duo as they’re well clear of third-placed German Lisa Buckwitz, the reigning two-time overall World Cup champ, who’s on 760.
Buckwitz had led after the first run in Sigulda on Saturday, but slipped back to fourth while Walker clocked runs of 53.12sec and 53.36sec (aggregate, 1min 46.48sec) to pip Nolte (1:46.59) and Austrian Katrin Beierl (1:46.62) to top spot on the podium.
That makes it two wins and three podium finishes from four starts for the consistent Walker in this campaign. She’ll next be in action on January 3 in Winterberg, Germany.
AAP
