WINTER OLYMPICS : Four-Man Bobsled : USA 1 Comes Within 2/100ths of a Bronze

There aren’t many things that can be done in 2/100ths of a second, but missing an Olympic medal is one of them.

Brent Rushlaw and his USA 1 sledmates finished that far out of third place here Sunday after the last two heats of the four-man bobsled competition.

Ekkehard Fasser of Switzerland drove the winning sled, his track-record run of 55.88 seconds in the third run moving him from third place to the lead.

Fasser, retiring after this season, had a total time of 3 minutes 47.51 seconds, beating Wolfgang Hoppe of East Germany by only 7/100ths of a second. Ianis Kipours, the Latvian who drives the Soviet Union’s No. 2 sled, was third, by 2/100ths of a second.

“You think back and you think where you might have picked up 2/100ths,” Rushlaw, a 36-year-old, four-time Olympian from Saranac Lake, N.Y., said through a spokesman. He has not talked directly to reporters since the Winter Games began here more than two weeks ago.

“But although I feel disappointed, I also feel good,” he added. “It’s the highest (one of his sleds has) ever finished, and we’ll be back in four years. Maybe we’ll get ‘em then.”

Maybe so. But maybe he also will never have a better chance than he had here.

Rushlaw was in fifth place after Saturday’s first two heats and had dropped to sixth, thanks to surprisingly fast runs by the two Austrian sleds in the third heat.

But in the fourth, Rushlaw had the best starting berth of the contending sleds. His was the third sled down the slide and he made the most of it, cranking what turned out to be the fastest run of the heat, 57.20 seconds.

Then he watched as the mid-morning sun continued to warm the track, making it slower for those who drove it later.

The Austrian sleds that had been so fast just an hour or so earlier couldn’t match his time and slipped below him in the standings. Fasser and Hoppe couldn’t beat his time, either, but they had comfortable time cushions to fall back on, drove smooth runs and maintained their 1-2 standing.

Finally, it came down to Kipours, gold medalist in the two-man competition, whose sled was the last down the track.

In a remarkable performance, the four Soviet sliders pushed their sled off the top of the run in 5.15 seconds, tying the best push time of the weekend. The rest of the run was ordinary, but the big push saved their borscht.

U.S. Coach Jeff Jost was impressed.

“We’re going to get the bronze medal. The Russians are going to fail their doping test,” he said in jest, marveling at the Soviets’ performance. “A 5.15 start!

“I was looking at the board there and I saw the 57 (seconds) and the numbers rolling up and it hit that 8 and I went, ‘Yeah,’ and it stopped. It stopped at (57.)85 and we needed 57.87.

“So close, so close.”

Although Rushlaw chose not to meet the press, his sledmates did and one of them, pusher Mike Wasko, said that a bit of serendipity--an unexpected improvement in push times--was responsible for the team’s strong showing.

“We did a little experimenting in training this week with Brent,” he said. “He got into the sled about three steps earlier than he usually does (because) he hurt his back in the two-man (competition last Monday.)

“One day in practice he got in earlier and we felt the sled accelerate. I thought Bill (White) or somebody was pushing a little extra hard, and it turned out to be Brent getting in one or two steps earlier.

“We just took it from there and told him, ‘If you get in earlier, we think we’re going to improve our push time.’ So that’s what we did for the races.”

Considering that the bobsled team was split by dissension and controversy during its entire stay here, however, it came as no great surprise when Jost directly contradicted that bit of intelligence.

“We talked about the start and I told (Rushlaw) he had to run (the start) out a little further,” Jost said. “He had to help out by running a couple more steps and all the other guys had to take a couple more steps. . . . Once it breaks over the hill, you got to be able to pick up just a little bit more by staying with the sled a little bit longer.”

All agreed, however, that despite the family squabbles, bobsledding in the United States is on the way back.

Said Jost: “Brent was driving a 2-year-old sled, a stock sled, against these state-of-the-art sleds. We have to get our technology program in there. We had an experimental sled that just came up and we ran out of time. Hopefully, we’ll have that for the next Olympics.

“They’re in gear now, and I’m sure now how important it’s going to be. You can’t do it without all the elements of winning--the push, the driver and the sled. You need all three.”

Added Wasko: “The U.S. was fifth in ’84 and now we’re fourth in ‘88, so maybe we’ll be first in ’92. The bobsled federation and the team are making great strides to get good athletes--track athletes and football players.

“I think as long as we get the good athletes to stay with the program, we’re going to have a hell of a team. We’ll be right up there with the European countries--the Russians, the East Germans. In ‘92, we’re going to be competitors for the gold medal, without a doubt.”

A team with a little further to go is the one from Jamaica, which caught the public’s fancy here with its colorful uniforms, posters, T-shirts, sweat shirts and its “Hobbin’ and a’bobbin’ ” slogan.

Driver Dudley Stokes got too high in a turn and crashed in the third heat, the sled flipping onto its side and bouncing the sliders’ helmeted heads against one of the sidewalls. No one was seriously hurt but the Jamaicans skipped the fourth heat.