Doubles, Open
| Date | 17 February 2010 | |
|---|---|---|
| Status | Olympic | |
| Location | Whistler Sliding Centre, Whistler | |
| Participants | 40 from 11 countries | |
| Format | Two runs, total time determined placement. | |
| Details | Curves: 14 Length: 953 m Start Altitude: 883 m Vertical Drop: 96 m | |
The doubles event in Vancouver was the hardest of all the luge competitions to predict. Five different pairings had tasted victory on the 2009-10 World Cup circuit with only the German pairings of André Florschütz and Torsten Wustlich and Patric Leitner and Alexander Resch posting repeat victories.
The course was shortened to the junior course, following the fatal accident that befell Nodar Kumaritashvili earlier in the week. After the first run the European champions, Austrian brothers Wolfgang and Andreas Linger, led by 0.088 seconds from the Latvian siblings Andris and Juris Šics, with Christian Oberstolz and Patrick Gruber (ITA) in third place. However a tremendous run by Patric Leitner and Alexander Resch (GER), the 2nd fastest run of the of the second round, saw them move up from 5th place and take the bronze medal. The Linger brothers and Šics brothers held on to take gold and silver medals respectively.
It proved a memorable Olympic Games for the Linger family as the two brothers had been given the rare honour of being co-bearers of the Austrian flag at the opening ceremony. The performance of the Šics brothers was a surprise as they had never before finished above third in any race at the highest level.
| Pos | Pair | NOC | Time | Run #1 | Run #2 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Andreas Linger / Wolfgang Linger |  AUT | 1:22.705 | 41.332 (1) | 41.373 (1) | Gold | ||
| 2 | Andris Šics / Juris Šics |  LAT | 1:22.969 | 41.420 (2) | 41.549 (3) | Silver | ||
| 3 | Patric Leitner / Alexander Resch |  GER | 1:23.040 | 41.566 (5) | 41.474 (2) | Bronze | ||
| 4 | Patrick Gruber / Christian Oberstolz |  ITA | 1:23.112 | 41.527 (3) | 41.585 (4) | |||
| 5 | André Florschütz / Torsten Wustlich | GER | 1:23.190 | 41.545 (4) | 41.645 (5) | |||
| 6 | Christian Niccum / Dan Joye |  USA | 1:23.291 | 41.602 (6) | 41.689 (6) | |||
| 7 | Chris Moffat / Mike Moffat |  CAN | 1:23.398 | 41.675 (7) | 41.723 (7) | |||
| 8 | Markus Schiegl / Tobias Schiegl | AUT | 1:23.528 | 41.727 (8) | 41.801 (8) | |||
| 9 | Oswald Haselrieder / Gerhard Plankensteiner | ITA | 1:23.649 | 41.789 (9) | 41.860 (9) | |||
| 10 | Vladimir Makhnutin / Vladislav Yuzhakov |  RUS | 1:23.746 | 41.798 (10) | 41.948 (11) | |||
| 11 | Branislav Regec / Ján Harniš |  SVK | 1:23.942 | 42.018 (13) | 41.924 (10) | |||
| 12 | Oskars Gudramovičs / Pēteris Kalniņš | LAT | 1:23.995 | 41.982 (12) | 42.013 (13) | |||
| 13 | Mark Grimmette / Brian Martin | USA | 1:24.005 | 41.821 (11) | 42.184 (16) | |||
| 14 | Mikhail Kuzmich / Stanislav Mikheyev | RUS | 1:24.155 | 42.174 (15) | 41.981 (12) | |||
| 15 | Justin Snith / Tristan Walker | CAN | 1:24.220 | 42.100 (14) | 42.120 (14) | |||
| 16 | Andriy Kis / Yuriy Haiduk |  UKR | 1:24.355 | 42.219 (17) | 42.136 (15) | |||
| 17 | Cosmin Chetroiu / Ionuț Țăran |  ROU | 1:24.631 | 42.360 (18) | 42.271 (17) | |||
| 18 | Luboš Jíra / Matěj Kvíčala |  CZE | 1:24.663 | 42.204 (16) | 42.459 (18) | |||
| 19 | Roman Zakharkiv / Taras Senkiv | UKR | 1:25.362 | 42.767 (19) | 42.595 (20) | |||
| 20 | Andrei Anghel / Paul Ifrim | ROU | 1:25.473 | 43.007 (20) | 42.466 (19) |