Two, Men1

The competition in the two-man event was wide open. There was defending World Champion Reto Capadrutt of Switzerland, and home favourite Hanns Kilian of Garmisch. The Romanians entered 1934 World Champion Alexandru Frim, and Britain sent 4-man bronze medallist Freddie McEvoy. But none of these crews would medal. The 1935 North American Championships were rather unknown in Europe, but that did not mean they weren’t strong. Ivan Brown and Al Washbond basically decided the competition competition in the very first run, taking an insurmountable lead of nearly three seconds. They did not win any of the remaining runs, but still had a rather comfortable 1.35 second lead over Switzerland II. That sled was steered by Fritz Feierabend, who had already won a silver medal in the four-man event as a crewman for Capadrutt. He had placed 6th in the first run, but won the three remaining runs to move up to the silver medal position. Third place was taken by the second USA sled, which was steered by Gil Colgate, Jr. He was the great-grandson of the William Colgate, founder of the soap and toothpaste company Colgate (now Colgate-Palmolive). He would later become a director of that corporation.

Further back in the field, Eduard, Baron von Falz-Fein was one of the first four competitors from the tiny nation of Liechtenstein to compete in the Olympics. He had founded the Liechtenstein NOC the previous year to make participation possible. The Baron would return to the Olympics no less than 15 times, in various official functions, including for the Liechtensteinstein NOC, the Liechtenstein Cycling Association, and the International Luge Federation.