Intro:

Maximilian Arndt led a German clean sweep of the podium in round six of the FIBT 4-man Bobsleigh World Cup on Sunday, beating compatriots Manuel Machata and Thomas Florschuetz on home ice in Altenberg.

Script:

Round six of the FIBT 4-man Bobsleigh World Cup took place at the artificial track in Altenberg, Germany on Sunday.

Neither World Cup standings leader Alexandr Zubkov of Russia took part in the event and the only other man to win a race this season, Switzerland's Beat Hefti, was also absent.

Germany III, piloted by Manuel Machata, was a third of a second off the pace in fifth, but produced a storming second run of 55.78 seconds which would not be bettered.

Thomas Florschuetz in Germany II also failed to better Machata's combined time of 1 minute 51.32 seconds and with just two more entries to come, Machada and his team of Alex Mann, Jan Speer and Christian Poser were guaranteed a podium finish.

Half a second came down to a third, then 0.21 seconds and finally twelve hundredths, but Arndt finally crossed the line in 56.05 seconds for a combined time of 1:51.26 and victory by just six one-hundredths of a second.

As a result, with six of the scheduled nine events on the calendar completed, Arndt now tops the World Cup points standings with 1139, 29 ahead of Alexandr Zubkov.