A bobsleigh is
a streamlined sled with two sets of steel runners. Two or four
people sit in a bobsleigh and the front person uses a wheel or
rope to steer the sled. The end person uses the brakes, but only
in an emergency. The competitors lean back and then jerk forward
to help with the steering and to make the sled go faster; this
body movement is called bobbing.
A bobsleigh run is a least 1500 metres long and has no less than 15 banked turns. Sometimes special refrigerators are built into the runs to stop the ice from melting.
In competition, each team completes four runs of the course.The times of each run are added together and the team with the fastest time wins. During a race a boblseigh can reach speeds of more than 140 kilometres per hour.
Bobsleighing was invented in 1888 by an Englishman, Wilson Smith, who linked two sleds together. The first bobsleighing competitions were held in Switzerland. Bobleighing has been an Olympic sport, for men, since 1924. The first women's bobsleigh event - the two-woman bobsled - was held in 2002.
Skeleton racing Competitors lie face down on a tiny sled and plummet, without brakes, head-first down a steep ice track. The sport got its name because the early sleds looked a bit like a human skeleton!
Go here to read more about this sport
http://www.olympic.org/en/content/Sports/All-Sports/Bobsleigh/Bobsleigh/
If you use any of this information in your own work
acknowledge this source in your bibliography like this:
Thomas, Ron & Sydenham, Shirley. Bobsleigh
[Online] www.kidcyber.com.au (2010)
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