Olympic champion Felix Loch led a German sweep of the top three places in the men's singles World Cup luge race at the Whistler Sliding Centre on Friday night.
The meet is the first major international luge competition at the venue since the 2010 Winter Olympics, when Georgian athlete Nodar Kumaritashvili died in a crash hours before the opening ceremonies.
Loch had a two-run time of 1 minute, 36.480 seconds. Johannes Ludwig was second in 1:36.758, and David Moller third in 1:36.778.
Isaac Underwood, of Skandia, Mich., and Taylor Morris, of South Jordan, Utah, raced in their first career World Cup events. The 20-year-old Morris finished 25th in 1:38.317, and Underwood, also 20, was 28th in 1:38.632.
Earlier, Olympic champions Andreas and Wolfgang Linger won the doubles race. They had a two-run time of 1:22.644, setting a track record of 41.255 on their first run. Austrian's Peter Penz and Georg Fischler were second in 1:22.888, followed by Italy's Christian Oberstolz and Patrick Gruber in 1:22.943.
Matt Mortensen, of Huntington Station, N.Y., and Preston Griffall of Salt Lake City, were 12th in 1:23.378, and Shane Hook, of Grapevine, Texas, and Zac Clark of Salt Lake City, finished 18th in 1:27.434.
Two-time Olympian Christian Niccum, of Woodinville, Wash. and Jayson Terdiman, of Berwick, Pa., were 12th at the halfway point of the race, but were disqualified in the second run for a runner that was less than one degree above the control temperature.
