Spießbergbahn

The Spießbergbahn during the competition for the GDR championship in the single-seater toboggan in 1964

The Spießbergbahn south of the Thuringian spa and sports resort Friedrichroda is one of the oldest German bobsleigh and racing sled runs and is one of the few natural ice rinks in Europe that is still used today for luge competitions.

history

Postage stamp motif "Ladies single-seater" for the planned Luge World Cup 1966 on the Spießbergbahn

Stamp motif "two-seater"

Stamp motif "gentlemen's single seaters"

The origins of the Spießbergbahn lie in the natural route on the Red Trail. This leads from Friedrichroda through the forest up to the former ducal forester's house (now the “Spießberghaus” restaurant) on the Spießberg ( 748 m above sea level ) directly on the Rennsteig . The people of Friedrichroda have always liked to use the steep path in winter to toboggan with sledges.

The Friedrichrodaer textile merchant Carl Benzing (1869–1955), who was married to a Swiss woman, got to know the still young bobsleigh sport around 1900 in his wife's homeland . He then had local craftsmen construct a steel bobsleigh with cable steering, which he first tried out on the Red Trail in 1901. The open five-man bobsleigh known by Benzing as “Black Peter” is considered the first German bobsleigh and made Friedrichroda the cradle of German bobsleigh.

In the winter of 1901/02 the first bobsleigh race with ten bobsleighs from Ilmenau , Waltershausen , Wickersdorf and Friedrichroda took place on the Rote Weg . Presumably this was the first bobsleigh race ever held in Germany. On February 22, 1905, the winter sports club (WSV) Friedrichroda was founded with the aim of promoting horn and toboggan rides as well as "racing wolf sport" (the racing wolf typical of Friedrichroda was a tall tubular steel sled with bicycle steering ).

In 1909, the winter sports enthusiast Duke Carl Eduard von Sachsen-Coburg and Gotha (himself a bobsleigh driver, but preferred his own run on the Wadeberg in Oberhof ) allowed the construction of a regular bobsleigh run on the Spießberg, which was laid out parallel to the Rote Weg according to plans by Carl Benzing. The inauguration race planned for Boxing Day 1909 had to be postponed due to the warm weather. On February 2, 1910, the 2,450-meter-long Spießbergbahn was inaugurated with a so-called bobsleigh race . The Friedrichroda bobsleigh club was founded on January 21 of the same year. Several national races were held on the natural track up until the 1930s.

After the war-related interruption of competition operations between 1939 and 1945, the Spießbergbahn, which was badly in need of repair due to its age, was restored from 1949 by the members of the sports community (SG) "Fortuna" Friedrichroda and reopened with a race on New Year 1951. In the following two decades numerous national championships in both luge and two-man bobsleigh were held here. In addition to the Wadeberg bobsleigh track in Oberhof , the Spießbergbahn was the most frequently used bobsleigh and racing sledge track in the GDR for national competitions.

In 1964/65 it was expanded for the planned Xth Luge World Championships in 1966 and the curves from turn 2 onwards were made of solid construction. The retrofitting of the railway with an artificial icing system was rejected due to the costs. Due to the foehn in February 1966, however, the naturally icy track thawed, so that the world championships had to be canceled. In 1970, the GDR championship in the two-man bobsleigh was the last major bobsleigh race on the track, which from then on was only used for luge competitions. With the opening of the modern, artificially iceable Oberhof luge track in 1971, the old Spießbergbahn finally came to an end, which has not been used for major competitions since then.

In 1983, the lower part of the track was adapted to modern requirements (the upper 1000 meters of the line have not been used since then and are in ruins) and a new start area was created. In 2008 the still passable part of the Spießbergbahn was equipped with a floodlight system.

Big championships

1912: Bobsleigh Association Championships
1928: XII. German luge championships
1929: 1st steering luge race of the German Luge Association
1935: III. German Skeleton Championships
1938: IV. German Skeleton Championships
1953: GDR championship in luge
1961: GDR championship in luge
27./28. January 1963: GDR championships in the two-man bobsleigh
21-23 February 1964: GDR championship in luge
February 18, 1965: 4th Mitropa Cup race
8-13 February 1966: Xth Luge World Championships (canceled due to thaw)
24./25. February 1968: GDR championships in luge and two-man bobsleigh
February 23, 1969: GDR Luge Championships
1970: GDR championships in the two-man bobsleigh

Current usage

The lower part of the runway owned by the city of Friedrichroda, which is still passable today, is used by athletes from the 05 Friedrichroda eV bobsleigh and luge club. Both summer and winter competitions are held here and training for the youngsters is carried out here.

Annual competitions are the PVB race (party, club and operator races) , which has been held in winter since 2002, as well as the young toboggan competition for the Spießberg Cup held in autumn before the start of the season . From 2008 to 2013, the Fricheröd'sches Bergziegenrennen (mountain goat race), called the Fricheröd'sches Bergziegenrennen , was held every year for mountain bike riders, in which the toboggan run had to be driven from bottom to top as quickly as possible.

gallery

GDR championship 1963: Die Sieger Heft and John (SC Chemie Waltershausen) at the start
GDR championship 1963: The second-placed Nonn and Fuchs (SC Chemie Waltershausen) crossed the finish line
GDR Championship 1963: The third-placed Brand and Bodenstein (SC Medizin Friedrichroda) polishing the runners before the start
GDR championship 1963: The Ludwig / Baumbach duo (SG Motor Waltershausen) shortly before the start
GDR championship 1964: The winner in the single-seater, Ortrun Enderlein (SC Traktor Oberwiesenthal), on the track
GDR Championship 1964: The winner in the single-seater, Michael Köhler (SC Traktor Oberwiesenthal), on the way to the start
IV. Mitropa Cup Race 1965: Klaus Bonsack (left) lights the flame at the opening ceremony
GDR Championship 1969: The winner in the single-seater, Anna-Maria Müller (SC Traktor Oberwiesenthal), on the track
GDR Championship 1969: The winner in the single-seater, Klaus Bonsack (SC Traktor Oberwiesenthal), at the start

Technical specifications

The original track is 2450 meters long and has 18 curves. The winners of the German championships in the two-man bobsleigh in 1963 required a driving time of 2: 20.99 minutes for the entire route. Since 1983 only the lower section of the railway with five curves and a length of 1450 meters has been used. With an average gradient of nine percent, the section that is still in use overcomes a height difference of 125 meters.

Others

The Spießbergbahn is the last German natural ice rink on which racing sled competitions are still held and one of the last of its kind in Europe. The upper part of the original runway, which has not been used for around four decades, is increasingly falling into disrepair. The fairway is already completely covered by soil and roots over long stretches and the walls of the curves are covered with moss. The wooden buildings at the original men's and women's start, which were used until the 1970s, are still preserved, as are the buildings for the interim measurement at the Sprengkurve and the roundabout , but all buildings are in a state of progressive deterioration. Until 2016, a sign at the old start opposite the "Spießberghaus" restaurant referred to the history of the traditional railway.

Near the finish line, a small memorial stone with a metal plaque reminds of the Friedrichroda bobsleigh pioneer Benzing. The inscription reads: Dedicated to the builder of the bobsleigh run, Karl Benzing. Bobsleigh in Friedrichroda. In addition, the forest path leading from the finish line in the direction of Friedrichroda is named in his honor, the Carl-Benzing-Weg.

Numerous nationally and internationally successful Thuringian luge athletes began their careers on the Spießbergbahn. a. Klaus Bonsack , Anna-Maria Müller , Karsten Albert , Margit Schumann , Jochen Asche , Ilona Brand , Bernd Oberhoffner , Melitta Sollmann , Horst Schönau and Volker Dietrich (both later also successful as bobsledders), René Friedl , Rolf Fuchs , Yves Mankel and the current national luge trainer Norbert Loch .

In the run-up to the planned Xth Luge World Championships on the Spießbergbahn, the GDR's Deutsche Post issued three special stamps with motifs from sledding on January 25, 1966. The values of 10 and 20 pfennigs designed by Klaus Hennig and Dietrich Dorfstecher were issued in an edition of eight million copies each, the value of 25 pfennig in an edition of 1.3 million copies.

Individual evidence

^ Carl Benzing and bobsleigh. In: Helga Raschke : Living and working in the northern Thuringian Forest. Sutton, Erfurt 2006, ISBN 3-89702-946-4 , p. 114 ff.

Web links

Commons : Spießbergbahn - collection of images, videos and audio files

50.832759 10.55096Coordinates: 50 ° 49 ′ 57.9 ″ N , 10 ° 33 ′ 3.5 ″ E

[1] Carl Benzing and bobsleigh. In: Helga Raschke : Living and working in the northern Thuringian Forest. Sutton, Erfurt 2006, ISBN 3-89702-946-4 , p. 114 ff.