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50 free Bobsleigh trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Bobsleigh (or bobsled, if you are American) began with bored Victorian tourists strapping delivery sleds together in the streets of St. Moritz, and it is now a sport where crews hit 150 km/h and pull 5 g through the corners. This quiz covers the whole story: Caspar Badrutt's hotel, the Cresta Run, the first purpose-built track in 1904, the four-man event at the very first Winter Olympics, the missing race of 1960 and the arrival of two-woman bobsleigh and monobob. There are questions on how the sport actually works: crew roles, sled lengths and weight limits, why races are timed to the hundredth, what a labyrinth is and why the push start matters. The people are here too: Eugenio Monti lending a bolt to his rivals, Kevin Kuske and Francesco Friedrich, Kaillie Humphries winning gold for two countries, Steven Holcomb's Night Train, and the real story behind Cool Runnings and the Jamaican team of 1988. About a third of the questions are easy for anyone who watches the Winter Olympics, a third are medium, and the rest will test committed sliding fans. Every answer is checked against reference and biography pages, and each question carries its source.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The first bobsleds were built in the 1880s by wealthy tourists from which country?
Britain
Wealthy British tourists at Caspar Badrutt's Palace Hotel adapted boys' delivery sleds and toboggans to race down the town's streets.
Q 02Where does the name bobsleigh come from?
Competitors bobbing back and forth to gain speed
The bobbing did not really help, but the name stuck to the sport and the sled.
Q 03Which hotelier got English guests to winter in St. Moritz, effectively inventing the winter resort?
Caspar Badrutt
He was frustrated that his hotel was only busy in summer, and by the 1870s wintering in St. Moritz was fashionable in Victorian Britain.
Q 04Why were the early sledders in St. Moritz eventually banned from the public roads?
Too many collisions with pedestrians
Badrutt's solution in the late 1870s was to build a natural-ice run outside town near the hamlet of Cresta.
Q 05The basic early bobsleigh was made by joining two of what together with a board?
Two skeleton sleds
The joined sleds got a steering mechanism at the front, which allowed longer, faster runs through the town.
Q 06The first purpose-built track solely for bobsleds opened outside St. Moritz in which year?
1902
The Olympia Bob Run St. Moritz-Celerina officially opened on New Year's Day 1904 and remains the world's only naturally refrigerated track.
Q 07The St. Moritz-Celerina track, the world's oldest, is unique among bobsleigh tracks in what way?
It is naturally refrigerated
It hosted the bobsleigh events at both the 1928 and 1948 Winter Olympics and is rebuilt from snow and ice every November.
Q 08The men's four-man bobsleigh has been contested at every Winter Olympics since the first Games, held where?
Chamonix
Only 39 bobsledders from five nations competed, and the rules allowed a fifth crew member.
Q 09Bobsleigh was left out of the Winter Olympics only once, in 1960. Why?
The organisers refused to build a track to save money
Squaw Valley in California decided a track was too expensive, which cost Eugenio Monti a shot at gold in his prime.
Q 10At the 1928 Winter Olympics the four-man bobsleigh was actually contested with how many crew?
Five
Crews were reduced to two or four in the 1930s; before then sleds sometimes carried five or six.
Q 11The two-man bobsleigh event was added to the Olympic programme at which Games?
1932 Lake Placid
The IBSF, the sport's federation, had been founded nine years earlier in 1923.
Q 12Two-woman bobsleigh made its Olympic debut at which Games?
2002 Salt Lake City
Women's bobsleigh had begun with two demonstration races at Lake Placid in 1983.
Q 13Which single-person event was added for women at the 2022 Winter Olympics?
Monobob
It was added so that men and women would have the same number of bobsleigh events; the sleds all come from a single manufacturer.
Q 21How many heats make up a bobsleigh competition at the Olympics and World Championships?
Four
Ordinary World Cup races are decided over two heats; times are recorded to the hundredth of a second.
Q 22The Cresta Run in St. Moritz is dedicated to which sliding sport?
Skeleton
Riders go head-first and prone; the run hosted the only two Olympic skeleton events before 2002, in 1928 and 1948.
Q 23The 1887 Grand National on the Cresta Run saw a Mr. Cornish pioneer what riding style?
Head-first
He finished fourteenth after some erratic rides, but by 1890 every competitor was riding that way.
Q 14Which two nations have been the most successful in bobsleigh across all major competitions?
Germany and Switzerland
Since the 1990s the Germans have won more medals than any other nation.
Q 15The reported world record speed for a bobsleigh, set at Whistler in 2019, is roughly what?
157 km/h
Ordinary competition speeds exceed 120 km/h, and some curves subject crews to as much as 5 g.
Q 16In bobsleigh track design, what is a labyrinth?
Three turns in quick succession with no straight
Every modern track must have at least one straight and one labyrinth, and ideally at least fifteen curves.
Q 17What is the maximum weight, including crew, of a four-man bobsleigh?
630 kg
Teams add metal weights to reach the limit; before the 1952 rule, crews were simply chosen to be as heavy as possible.
Q 18The four-person bobsleigh crew consists of a pilot, a brakeman and how many pushers?
Two
Pushers are picked for sprint speed and strength; the pilot needs the timing and finesse to find the fastest line.
Q 19How does a bobsleigh pilot steer the sled?
By pulling two metal rings linked to the front runners
Only tiny adjustments are needed; at 130 km/h a big movement causes a crash.
Q 20For roughly how far does the crew push the sled at the start before boarding?
Up to 50 metres
Grooves in the ice guide the sled through the start area, so the pilot does not need to steer until it leaves them.
Q 24Which of the three sliding sports is the slowest?
Skeleton
The face-down, head-first position is less aerodynamic than the face-up luge ride, and skeleton sleds are steered with the head and shoulders.
Q 25The IBSF World Championships in bobsleigh have been held annually since which year?
1930
Since 2002 they have not been held in Winter Olympic years; a two-man event followed in 1931.
Q 26At Innsbruck 1964, Italy's Eugenio Monti famously lent what to Britain's Nash and Dixon?
A bolt from his own sled
The Britons won gold and Monti took bronze; he became the first athlete awarded the Pierre de Coubertin World Trophy for sportsmanship.
Q 27Eugenio Monti finally won Olympic gold in both the two-man and four-man events in 1968 at what age?
40
He was the first non-German to do the double at one Games, and had switched from alpine skiing after wrecking both knees in 1951.
Q 28Eugenio Monti competed in which sport before a 1951 injury pushed him into bobsleigh?
Alpine skiing
The Flying Redhead had won Italian titles in slalom and giant slalom before tearing ligaments in both knees.
Q 29Four-time Olympic champion Kevin Kuske of Germany competed in what before bobsleigh?
Sprinting
He won a 4x100 m bronze at the 1998 World Junior Championships before spending 1999 to 2018 pushing for pilots such as André Lange.
Q 30Francesco Friedrich tied for 2018 Olympic two-man bobsleigh gold with a pair from which country?
Canada
Justin Kripps and Alexander Kopacz shared the podium's top step; Friedrich then won the four-man outright.