Cackett hails 'special' win

Greg Cackett described Sunday afternoon in Altenberg as ‘pretty special’ after he helped Great Britain win World Cup 4-man gold in Germany.

Cackett, Arran Gulliver, Taylor Lawrence and pilot Brad Hall became the first British team to win two 4-man gold medals in a single season as they broke a 17-year German dominance at the notoriously tough track.

The GB crew saw off all three German medalists from the 2022 Beijing Olympics to make it eight medals for the squad across just five 2-man and 4-man World Cup races so far this season, and they did so at a venue where Hall’s best finish in 11 attempts prior to this weekend was seventh.

“That was pretty special. We looked at coming to Altenberg for two weeks on a bogey track as good preparation for the World Championships and we’ve finished the first week with a gold medal. That feels pretty good!” said Cackett.

“Doing well here at a track we’ve not done well at before bodes so well for the World Champs, which is at another track where we haven’t been as good as we’d like in the past. It’s exciting times.

“Seeing Brad and Taylor win silver on Saturday gave us even more confidence that we could win the 4-man.

We’re setting such high standards now because we know what we’re capable of.

“Brad’s driving great and we know that, if we give him a decent push, he can get us on the podium anywhere in the world.”

Great Britain added a win in Altenberg to victory in Placid

Cackett and co certainly achieved that objective of giving Hall a platform to top the podium as they went quickest off the top in the second heat having been second fastest first time around.

No team has gone quicker than GB’s 5.06 start at Altenberg in World Cup competition, with only two crews (Francesco Friedrich and Oskar Kibermanis) going faster at the 2020 and 2021 World Championships.

Not a bad statistic for a team that includes a rookie push athlete who’d never even been on ice until October!

“We always want to be the fastest starters so to pull out a 5.06 in the second run was a great feeling for all of us,” added Cackett, who was a sprinter before switching to bobsleigh in 2016. 

“We know how important it is to be in a good place going into the first corner so to go two hundredths quicker than anyone else all day is just huge for us.

The push has been consistently quick all season - we know we can produce when we need to.

“Arran’s only been sliding for a couple of months but he’s been amazing. To come in and help give us starts like that so early in his career is incredible.

“Big shout out to Graham Richardson, our coach, as well. He’s bought into how we work as a crew and has been a really calming presence throughout the season. He gets what we need to perform and his experience of the sport is second to none.”