Canadian Doubles, Slalom, Men

Twin brothers Pavol and Peter Hochschorner of Slovakia had won the C-2 slalom at the last two editions of the Olympics and were the reigning European and World Champions, all of which made them strong favorites to defend their title once again at the 2008 Games. They were the top-ranked duo in the qualifiers, but were bested by Germany’s Felix Michel and Sebastian Piersig in the semi-final, which was new round in Beijing wherein the ten qualifiers were whittled down to six after one run. The Czech Republic’s Jaroslav Volf and Ondřej Štěpánek who were, among other titles, the 2004 Olympic bronze medalists and the 2004 and 2005 European and 2006 World Champions, came in third. This order remained the same after the first run of the final, but changed after a disastrous run in the second portion left the Germans not only last in that round, but last overall. The Slovakians and the Czechs were again second and third, which allowed them to claim gold and silver respectively, even though they were defeated in the second run by Cédric Forgit and Martin Braud of France. Forgit and Braud were the 2006 European champions, but their fifth-place ranking after the first round prevented them from climbing higher than fourth overall after the second run. Thus Russia’s Mikhail Kuznetsov and Dmitry Larionov, who had been fourth in both portions, took bronze. The Hochschorner brothers’ victory made them the first duo or team to win three consecutive gold medals with the same lineup. In 2012 two other teams with the same lineup won their third medal in the same event” Americans Venus and Serena Williams in tennis doubles (2000, 2008, 2012) and Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor in beach volleyball (2004, 2008, and 2012).