For the Olympic Winter Games in Pyeongchang, the Bobsleigh World Federation IBSF is planning to use a four-man team with athletes from North and South Korea as track sledges.
This was announced by the IBSF on Wednesday. The mixed team would test the track conditions before the four-man bobsleigh races on 24. and 25. This could be a further sign of rapprochement between the Member States.
“Bobsport is a team sport like no other,”said IBSF President Ivo Ferriani:”The athletes have to work together perfectly and trust each other in the tightest of spaces. A joint bobsleigh team would bring the athletes of both countries closer together.”
Ferriani is currently planning this mission together with IBSF Vice President Darrin Steele. The two former bobsleigh athletes could therefore train the team. Plans call for the deployment of an experienced pilot and a pusher from South Korea, as well as two other pusher from North Korea. The IOC is currently examining the proposal.
North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un had already in his New Year’s speech surprisingly announced that he wanted to send athletes and other representatives to the games in the south.
South Korea wants a joint women’s ice hockey team. It would be the first joint sporting appearance of the hostile states on the Olympic stage in 70 years. In 1948, Korea, which was still united at the time, had played in St. Peter’s Winter Games. Moritz and in the summer in London.
In addition, both teams could enter together at the opening and closing ceremony. So far, this has only been the case at the Summer Games 2000 in Sydney and 2004 in Athens and, for the last time, at the 2006 Winter Games in Turin.