Canadians win team relay bronze at luge world championships

Canada captured a bronze medal in the team relay event at the world luge championships Sunday in Sigulda, Latvia.

The team of Alex Gough (Calgary), Sam Edney (Calgary), Tristan Walker (Cochrane, Alta.) and Justin Snith (Calgary) finished with a combined time of two minutes, 14.129 seconds.

Germany, a team made up of Natalie Geisenberger, Felix Loch, Tobias Wendl and Andrey Medvedev won the event in 2:13.152.

Russia, which is comprised by Tatiana Ivanova, Semen Pavlichenko, Andrey Bogdanov and Andrey Medvedev took home the silver in 2:13.234.

All four members of the Canadian team hail from Calgary.

Led by one of the best women’s sliders in the world, Gough set the tone for Canada. Edney then powered down the track, setting the stage for the doubles tandem of Snith and Walker to finish off the bronze-medal performance.

“It was enjoyable to get on the podium in Latvia after having the Latvian team snuff us one year ago at the Olympics for that bronze medal,” said Edney.

“Our team needed this result overall. It hasn’t come as easy to us this year as it has in the past. It’s clear to us other nations have caught up and are set on raising the bar so winning a bronze medal on a track like Sigulda means a lot to our entire team, and we are thrilled to bring it home for Canada.”

However, there was some controversy after the Canadians' run.

There was doubt as to whether Edney touched the green finishing pad at the end of the track. But officials determined Edney did in fact hit touch the pad after reviewing the video.

“My second run earlier in the day in singles race got affected by some win on the start and I lost my opportunity at a top-10,” added Edney, who said the race was a bit of a crap shoot at times with the conditions.

“I tried to bottle up that energy for the team relay. Alex had a solid run time, and I had a fantastic run so I was happy.”