BEAR HOLLOW — America's three women bobsled crews brought home the gold, silver and bronze in the final event of seven World Cup races Saturday at the Utah Olympic Park.
A crowd of around 1,200 paying fans screamed hysterically at the amazing finish.
Not only did the three blow away the competition in the race, which attracted 28 teams from 18 countries, but winning driver Jean Racine, Park City, and brakeman Jennifer Davidson,
Layton, also racked up enough points to win the World Cup itself.
Racine and Davidson had won most of the earlier World Cup competitions around the globe. But for the sixth race, held here on Saturday, they only won the bronze. They broke through in the seventh and last contest with a nearly perfect performance.
The sweep was about as close as it could possibly be.
Racine and Davidson had a combined time in two heats of 1:38.26.
Second place went to Bonny Warner, Discovery Bay, Calif., and her brakeman, Vonnetta Flowers, of Birmingham, Ala. Their time, 1:38.27, was only 0.01 of a second off the lead.
Third were driver Jill Bakken, Salt Lake City, and her brakeman, Kristi McGihon, San Diego, whose time of 1:38.33 was a mere 0.07 of a second behind the lead.
Following the first heat, the top 15 teams competed in reverse order, with the slowest of that group — Canada's Christine Fraser and Kristy Lees — running first and the fastest, Racine and Davidson, starting 15th.
To the delight of the Utahns watching, the second heat ended with sleds finishing in the same order as the first.
Beginning their second run, Racine and Davidson crouched at the start line, made a little hop, and started fast. Their push time for the first 50 meters was a swift 5.45. Their sleek black bobsled flew flawlessly around the curves.
At one crucial curve, the official timer showed them tied with Warner and Flowers at that point. But then they pulled ahead by 0.01 of a second.
They whipped under the finish line (a plywood replica of Arches National Park's Delicate Arch), then as the sled stopped, the two hugged. Someone in the yelling crowd screamed, "Way to go, Jean!"
Teammates swarmed them, hugging, and they waved with their arms in the air. Whistles and yells filled the air.
"I honestly thought at one point, you know, it would be really cool if we tied," said Warner. Flowers, her brakeman, said the second-place finish motivates her to work harder.
Bakken said she was glad she and McGihon won a medal. She tore her knee earlier and may face surgery.
Racine said she and Davidson want to "recuperate from the season of thrashing . . . and we'll start working on putting on some weight on our bodies and getting some muscle tone and just getting huge."
The crew's biggest disadvantage, she said, is that they are light and have to push heavy sleds. All sleds are of equal weight, counting the crews and sleds, and if the women are not as heavy, the sled has to carry more pounds to make up for it.
"We're like one of the lightest teams that's competitive," Racine said. "Our sled is actually heavier than everyone else's. So our goal next year is to put some weight on ourselves so we can take it out of our sled and keep up with those fast cars."
E-mail: bau@desnews.com