Friedrich KUHN

Fritz Kuhn, hailing from München, qualified for the two-man event at the 1952 Olympics, finishing 12th with Theo Kitt. While their compatriots Andreas Ostler and Lorenz Nieberl won that event, things looked bleak for the German teams in the four-man event, as they were outpaced by heavier competitors. In order to have a shot at the title, the second German sled wasn't entered, and instead the three heaviest pushers - Kuhn among them - joined Ostler in the remaining sled. This gave the Germans, weighing in at 472 kg (including sled) a decisive advantage, and they comfortably slid to the gold. The international bobsleigh federation (FIBT) soon afterwards decided to limit the weight for four-man teams at 420 kg. In 2006 the story about the 1952 German four-man bob was told in a cinema comedy called Schwere Jungs (Heavy Boys).