Lake Placid, N.Y. - This whole process of treating World Cup events as building blocks for the Vancouver Olympics? Lyndon Rush doesn't mind if he can pick up the odd technical tidbit here and there along with valuable points.

He can do without large lessons like this weekend's however. With fire-plug brakeman Lascelles Brown sidelined with sore ankles sustained in a training crash on Wednesday, Rush's two 5.11-second starts were not good enough in the second World Cup four-man bobsleigh event of the year.

Rush, of Sylvan Lake, Alta., finished seventh in a combined time of 1:50.59, just a tick under a full second behind the winning time of U.S. driver Steve Holcomb (1:49.60.) John Napier, who lives less than a mile from the Mt. van Hoeverden track, finished second in 1:50.44 piloting a crew usually led by the injured Todd Hays.

Pierre Lueders of Edmonton was ninth in 1:50.79.

"You crash your guys during the week, and you don't get to test runners ..... you screw up your whole week. I screwed it up," said Rush, who had Dave Bresciani as his brakeman.

"One little mistake and - boom - Placid will bite you, right?" Lueders and Rush finished fourth and seventh, respectively, in Saturday's two-man race, which was won by Napier.

Canadian coach Tuffy Latour said that Brown "banged his ankle," in the accident and that he would be ready to go in two weeks time in Cesana, Italy.

Rush's team has this week off, with Lueders' scheduled to compete at the Europa Cup in Konigsee with Jesse Lumsden as his brakeman.

The Canadian women fared better, with Kaillie Humphries of Calgary and Heather Moyse of Summerside, PEI, earning a bronze medal in Saturday's women's race.

In just her fourth year as a driver, Humphries turned in a veteran's performance after she and Moyse tied the track record starting time and ruined a podium sweep by Germany.

The Germans were 1-2-3 after the first race and they obliterated the field in getting the first two spots, with Cathleen Martini's time of one minute, 56.15 seconds more than a full second faster than Humphries' time of 1:57.23. Sandra Kiriasis of Germany was second in 1:56.56. Helen Upperton of Calgary placed seventh in a time of 1:57.46 while Amanda Stepenko, also of Calgary, was 12th in 1:58.17.

The Canadian women's program is rotating brake-men.

"Yes and no," said Humphries, of Calgary, when asked if she can tell when her team has nailed a start. "Generally, we have amazing brakemen in Team Canada, anyhow. Any four could give us a start record.

With the brakemen we have, all I need is to be consistently." Lueders, who finished ninth at Park City while Rush won his first-ever World Cup event, said the Canadians goal was to get as many points as possible to give them a favorable position heading into Whistler.

"The whole goal for this season is to get as many points as possible so we don't find ourselves starting 13th or 14th," said Lueders.

"The first six sleds will have an advantage and then the big four-man sleds will start to chew up the track. What we saw in Whistler (at last year's World Cup) was that after the eighth sled, the track was two-tenths slower."

The Canadian bobsleigh program was in state of flux after Rush's four-man win. The sliding community is watching to see how Lueders adapts to Canada II status.

Brown, who has said publicly he won't push for Lueders, politely declined commenting on whether the team dyanamics have changed.

"One of the goals I always had, when Chris Lori retired, was to try to develop and keep the results going. I was able to do that for many years," said Lueders.

"At some point in time there's a natural progression where you have to accept that you're a little older. I'm not 20 any more.

"That means that I've done my job as my teammates before me did theirs to keep the program growing and getting stronger into the future."