Egle soars to maiden World Cup victory

Madeleine Egle enjoyed individual and collective success on a memorable day of World Cup action for the Austrian.

On the same track which will be used for February's Olympic Winter Games, the Yanqing Sliding Centre, Egle mastered the conditions quicker than her rivals in the women's competition to claim her first ever World Cup victory on the opening weekend of the campaign.

The 23-year-old's overall time of 1:58.822s put her clear of world champion Julia Taubitz, who took second, with Lisa Schulte finishing third for the first World Cup podium of her career.

"It's really cool that I now have a World Cup victory and can take the yellow bib of the World Cup leader with me," Egle said.

"The beginning was a bit bumpy, I had a hard time in training. It got better and better, but you couldn't expect that. But sometimes there are surprises."

Egle did not have to wait long to add another World Cup gold to her tally as she joined forces with David Gleirscher, Thomas Steu and Lorenz Koller to land the team relay.

Egle and Gleirscher had difficulties in their run but Steu and Koller made up a deficit of more than half a second to earn Austria victory ahead of the USA and Italy.