FIL Events
The FIL governs competitions on artificial tracks and natural tracks at both the European and World Championship levels. At the Winter Olympics, artificial tracks competitions are only contested. The events at the European and World Championships are men's singles, men's doubles, women's singles, and a team event consisting of one run each from men's singles, men's doubles, and women's singles.
Artificial tracks are tracks that have their curves specifically designed and banked with walled-in straightaways. Made of reinforced concrete and cooled with ammonia refrigeration, these tracks are smooth and have g-forces of up to 4g (Four times the athlete's body weight). Men's singles on most tracks have their start house close to the bobsleigh and skelton start locations while both the men's doubles and women's singles have their start house located further down the track. As of 2009, there are sixteen bobsleigh, luge, and skeleton artificial tracks worldwide with a 17th track near Moscow that will host Junior World Cup events in November 2009. Another track in Russia near Sochi, the Sliding Center Sanki, will be in use for the 2014 Winter Olympics, had construction started in May 2009 following controversies at a previous location over track start heights and it being near World Heritage Site, including near an endangered species of brown bear.
Natural tracks are tracks adopted from existing mountain roads and paths, including a horizontal track surface and natural track icing. Most of these tracks are located in Austria, Italy, Germany, Poland, Canada, the United States, and Slovenia.
Read more about this topic: International Luge Federation
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—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)