Luge at the 1976 Winter Games: Previous Winter Games ▪ Next Winter Games
Host City: Innsbruck, Austria
Venue(s): Artficial Bob and Luge Track, Igls
Date Started: February 4, 1976
Date Finished: February 7, 1976
Format: Four runs, total time determined placement.
| Gold: | Dettlef Günther |
| Silver: | Josef Fendt |
| Bronze: | Hans Rinn |
Once more, the competitors from East and West Germany divided the medals among them. The strength of the East German team was shown from the fact that the reigning World Champion and 1972 bronze medallist, Wolfram Fiedler, did not make the cut. This left 1973 World Champion Hans Rinn as the clear favourite. But he made a serious error in the first run, putting him 0.6 seconds behind Dettlef Günther, who had been the 1975 European Champion, but had only managed a 7th spot at the World Championships. Günther would also win the 3rd and 4th run, giving him a comfortable lead. Only West German Josef Fendt could seriously challenge him, but even the former World Champion (1970, 1973) had to concede half a second in the final standings.
The unluckiest slider in Innsbruck was without a doubt Huang Liu-Chong. He was actually the best non-European, as shown by his performances in the first and fourth run, but he finished last because of two crashes in the other two runs. Remarkably, he did finish both times, but ended up more than one minute behind the next-to-last luger – a huge gap in luge terms.
| Rank | Athlete | Age | Team | NOC | Medal | T | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dettlef Günther | 21 | East Germany | GDR | Gold | 3:27.688 | |
| 2 | Josef Fendt | 28 | West Germany | FRG | Silver | 3:28.196 | |
| 3 | Hans Rinn | 22 | East Germany | GDR | Bronze | 3:28.574 | |
| 4 | Hans-Heinrich Winckler | 21 | East Germany | GDR | 3:29.454 | ||
| 5 | Manfred Schmid | 31 | Austria | AUT | 3:29.511 | ||
| 6 | Anton Winkler | 21 | West Germany | FRG | 3:29.520 | ||
| 7 | Reinhold Sulzbacher | 31 | Austria | AUT | 3:30.398 | ||
| 8 | Dainis Bremze | 21 | Soviet Union | URS | 3:30.576 | ||
| 9 | Rudolf Schmid | 24 | Austria | AUT | 3:31.419 | ||
| 10 | Vladimir Shitov | 23 | Soviet Union | URS | 3:32.570 | ||
| 11 | Karl Brunner | 24 | Italy | ITA | 3:33.188 | ||
| 12 | Jan Kasielski | 21 | Poland | POL | 3:34.189 | ||
| 13 | Aigars Krikis | 21 | Soviet Union | URS | 3:34.695 | ||
| 14 | Stanislav Ptáčník | 19 | Czechoslovakia | TCH | 3:34.838 | ||
| 15 | Stefan Kjernholm | 24 | Sweden | SWE | 3:34.990 | ||
| 16 | Mirosław Więckowski | 23 | Poland | POL | 3:35.220 | ||
| 17 | Michael Gårdebäck | 19 | Sweden | SWE | 3:36.148 | ||
| 18 | Jindřich Zeman | 25 | Czechoslovakia | TCH | 3:36.167 | ||
| 19 | Andrzej Piekoszewski | 25 | Poland | POL | 3:36.259 | ||
| 20 | Morten Nordeide Johansen | 24 | Norway | NOR | 3:36.879 | ||
| 21 | Nils Vinberg | 18 | Sweden | SWE | 3:38.479 | ||
| 22 | Christian Strøm | 28 | Norway | NOR | 3:38.792 | ||
| 23 | Vladimír Resl | 22 | Czechoslovakia | TCH | 3:40.235 | ||
| 24 | Hidetoshi Sato | 25 | Japan | JPN | 3:40.931 | ||
| 25 | Richard Cavanaugh | 27 | United States | USA | 3:41.357 | ||
| 26 | James Murray | 29 | United States | USA | 3:42.152 | ||
| 27 | Kazuaki Ichikawa | 26 | Japan | JPN | 3:42.442 | ||
| 28 | Terry O'Brien | 32 | United States | USA | 3:42.536 | ||
| 29 | Michel de Carvalho | 31 | Great Britain | GBR | 3:42.665 | ||
| 30 | Jeremy Palmer-Tomkinson | 32 | Great Britain | GBR | 3:42.724 | ||
| 31 | Larry Arbuthnot | 28 | Canada | CAN | 3:42.784 | ||
| 32 | Max Beck | 24 | Liechtenstein | LIE | 3:44.782 | ||
| 33 | Richard Liversedge | 35 | Great Britain | GBR | 3:44.839 | ||
| 34 | Shieh Wei-Cheng | 19 | Chinese Taipei | TPE | 3:45.200 | ||
| 35 | Michael Shragge | Canada | CAN | 3:46.292 | |||
| 36 | Bjørn Dyrdahl | 31 | Norway | NOR | 3:47.044 | ||
| 37 | Peter Gschnitzer | 22 | Italy | ITA | 4:08.760 | ||
| 38 | Huang Liu-Chong | 25 | Chinese Taipei | TPE | 5:22.646 | ||
| AC | Paul Hildgartner | 23 | Italy | ITA | DNF | ||
| AC | Rainer Gassner | 17 | Liechtenstein | LIE | DNF | ||
| AC | Wolfgang Schädler | 17 | Liechtenstein | LIE | DNF | ||
| AC | Denis Michaud | 29 | Canada | CAN | DQ | ||
| AC | Stefan Hölzlwimmer | 24 | West Germany | FRG | DNF |