Justin Kripps facts for kids
Kripps in 2019
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| Personal information | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Nationality | Canadian | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | January 6, 1987 Naalehu, Hawaii, U.S. |
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| Residence | Summerland, British Columbia | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Height | 1.83 m | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Weight | 100 kg | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Country | Canada | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Sport | Bobsleigh | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Event(s) | Two-man | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Turned pro | 2007 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Medal record
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Justin Kripps (born January 6, 1987) is a Canadian bobsledder. He is an Olympic champion! He won a gold medal in the two-man bobsleigh event at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
Kripps also won a silver medal in the two-man event at the 2017 World Championships. He earned a bronze medal in the mixed team event at the 2012 World Championships. He has been competing in bobsleigh since 2006. He has achieved many top finishes in World Cup races. In the 2017–18 Bobsleigh World Cup season, he finished first in both the two-man and overall standings. This earned him the Crystal Globe trophy as the overall champion.
Becoming a Bobsledder
Justin Kripps started bobsledding in 2006. He was 19 years old at the time. Before bobsleigh, he competed in track and field at Simon Fraser University. He was part of a relay team that set a school record. Kripps saw bobsleigh as a cool mix of track and field speed and race car driving. This made him want to try the sport.
In his early years, Kripps was a brakeman. This person pushes the bobsled at the start and then pulls the brakes at the end. He won his first Bobsleigh World Cup race in January 2008. This was in Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy. He was part of a four-man team with Pierre Lueders, Ken Kotyk, and David Bissett. Kripps and Lueders were the very first people to slide down the Whistler Sliding Centre in British Columbia in 2007. They later competed together at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
Becoming a Driver
After the 2010 Olympics, Kripps decided he wanted to become a driver. The driver steers the bobsled down the track. He went to pilot school in the summer of 2010. For the 2010–11 season, he competed in the North American circuit. This helped him develop his skills.
He also competed at the 2011 World Junior Championships. There, he placed fifth in the two-man race and eighth in the four-man race. The next season, he raced on the Europa Cup circuit. His first Bobsleigh World Cup event as a driver was in February 2012 at Whistler. He won his first medal as a pilot at the FIBT World Championships in 2012. It was a bronze medal in the mixed team event.
Kripps won his first World Cup gold medal as a driver in 2014 at Königssee. During the 2014 Winter Olympics, his website was blocked in Russia. He joked about it on his Twitter account. In those Olympics, he finished sixth in the two-man event. This was the best result for a Canadian team. He then moved to the top Canadian sled for the four-man event. However, his sled overturned in the second run, and they did not finish.
Olympic and World Championship Success
During the 2016–17 Bobsleigh World Cup season, Kripps earned three more podium finishes. At the 2017 World Championships, he won a silver medal. His brakeman was Jesse Lumsden.
In the 2017–18 Bobsleigh World Cup season, Kripps had an amazing year. With brakemen Lumsden and Alexander Kopacz, he finished first in both the two-man and overall standings. This meant he won the Crystal Globe trophy for both categories.
At the 2018 Winter Olympics, Kripps and his brakeman Kopacz made history. They tied for the gold medal with the German team. This was Canada's sixth gold medal at those games. Kripps was leading after three runs. He finished the final run in exactly the same time as the German team. After the race, Kripps said he stayed calm and focused. He also mentioned that Pierre Lueders, who taught him to drive, had also tied for a gold medal 20 years earlier.
In January 2022, Kripps was chosen for Canada's 2022 Olympic team. He went on to win the bronze medal in the Four-man event. On August 25, 2022, Justin Kripps announced he was retiring from bobsleigh.
See also
In Spanish: Justin Kripps para niños
