Ekmanis started his sporting career as a triple jumper , where he became champion of the Latvian SSR in 1980 . In the autumn of the same year he switched to bobsleigh and was one of the most successful Soviet bobsleigh pilots in the 1980s. With his brakeman Vladimir Alexandrov , he won the bronze medal in the two-man bobsleigh at the Winter Olympics in Sarajevo in 1984 . Together with the brakeman Nikolai Schriow Ekmanis won the bronze medal at the 1985 Bobsleigh World Championship - also the first medal for the Soviet bobsleigh team. At the European Bobsleigh Championships Ekmanis was able to win a complete set of medals between 1984 and 1990. In 1984 and 1985 he achieved bronze and gold with Vladimir Alexandrow as a push, in 1990 he came second with Juris Tone . In his second Olympic participation in 1988 in Calgary Ekmanis finished ninth with Aivars Trops . From 1992, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union , he started for Latvia . At the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville he was 16 in both two-man and four-man bobsleigh; In 1994 he finished 10th (two) and 13th (four). Furthermore, Ekmanis was third in the overall World Cup of the 1987/88 season . In 1987 and 1990 he was also the Soviet champion and in 1992 the Latvian champion, both in the two-man bobsleigh.
After the end of his active career, Ekmanis worked as Vice President of the Latvian Bobsleigh Federation and commentator for bobsleigh competitions on Latvian national television.
Soviet Union Latvia
