CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Germany's Jacqueline Pfeifer and Briton Tabitha Stoecker continued their back-and-forth battle in their final skeleton training runs on Wednesday and will hope to continue that form when it matters on Friday when the battle for medals starts.
Pfeifer, second in the World Cup, was fastest in both of Wednesday's training runs, having also set the pace in the second of the six attempts each athlete has.
Right behind her, as she was in the World Cup rankings, was Stoecker, who chalked up four second-fastest and two fastest runs in a superbly consistent week.
Stoecker is looking to continue her country's great tradition in the event, which has brought three gold medals via Amy Williams in 2010 and Lizzy Yarnold (2014 and 2018).
Defending champion Hannah Neise improved on Wednesday after some scruffy runs in the first few days and, as her German compatriots showed in the luge, opponents should be wary of reading too much into training runs where athletes experiment with equipment and racing lines.
Even taking that caveat into account, Belgium's Kim Meylemans is searching for the form that earned her three wins and the World Cup title, with a seventh-placed finish in Wednesday's fifth run the best of her week.
Her wife, Brazilian Nicole Silveira, is also competing in Cortina.
World champion and 2022 Olympic bronze medallist Kimberley Bos of the Netherlands has also struggled with her speed this week, failing to make the top 12 in any of her runs.
Cortina also probably represents the last chance for Austria's veteran Janine Flock to make the podium.
The 36-year-old is in her 16th season and has been the overall World Cup winner three times, but at the Olympics she has finished ninth, fourth and 10th.
Despite a succession of shockingly slow starts, Flock has been in good form this week, posting the fastest time in the fourth run, and four others in the top five.
The first two runs of competition are on Friday, with the medals decided by the second two on Saturday.
(Reporting by Mitch Phillips, editing by Ken Ferris)
