Germany's Nolte/Levi lead after two runs in women's bobsleigh at Beijing 2022

YANQING, Beijing, Feb. 18 (Xinhua) -- Germany's Laura Nolte and her brakeman Deborah Levi built up a big lead after Friday's first two heats of the two-woman bobsleigh event at the Beijing Winter Olympics.

As Germany's rising star, Nolte appeared on the podium in six of the seven World Cup races she competed in the 2021-2022 season, with four victories.

In the first run, Nolte and Levi clocked one minute and 1.04 seconds, with another German pair of Mariama Jamanka/Alexandra Burghardt and Elana Meyers Taylor/Sylvia Hoffman of the United States trailing by 0.06 seconds and 0.22 seconds respectively.

In the second run, Nolte renewed her track record in one minute and 1.01 seconds, enlarging their overall advantage to 0.5 seconds. Jamanka/Burghardt and Meyers Taylor/Hoffman once again followed in second and third places.

"I knew it could happen, but I also thought in monobob that it could happen because I also had some good training runs in monobob. We did have some good runs in 2-man here too," said Nolte, who missed the podium in the women's monobob event by 0.3 seconds on Monday.

"I knew the race is always different, the other girls are strong too, so it would be a hard fight. At the end I think today we could show a really good show, and we have to do the same tomorrow," she said.

The host nation's bobsledders Huai Mingming and Wang Xuan ranked 11th out of 20 pairs, and their teammates Ying Qing and Du Jiani was in 13th place after two runs.

"We did a good job in the first run, except for some mistakes in the first two curves," Ying said.

"I wanted to adjust my techniques in the second round, but I didn't do well enough while making some curves," Ying added.

Du, Ying's brakeman and the 2020 U23 Junior World Championships' medalist, said she was nervous and excited in her debut at the Winter Olympics.

"I try to imitate the elites' move and use a new way during the start progress. In fact, I made progress in the official training session before the competition," the 22-year-old said.

"I hoped that we would keep the momentum in the next two runs," Du added.

The last two runs of the two-woman bobsleigh will take place on Saturday.