Daring Martins Dukurs is whistling a happy tune

Marvellous Martins Dukurs put himself put himself in pole position for a sixth world title as he set a new track record at Whistler while shining in the opening two heats of the men's skeleton at the IBSF World Championships.

Eurosport

Image credit: TNT Sports

The Latvian, who also has two Olympic silver medals to his name and has been European champion a whopping 10 times, is sitting pretty at the top of the leaderboard ahead of Friday's third and fourth runs.

Dukurs, 34, also left an indelible mark on the Whistler track as he set a new gold standard time of 51.91 seconds in his second heat.

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Having already clocked with 51.25 in his first showing, Dukurs totted up an overall time of 1:44.06, enjoying an advantage of 0.37 seconds over Russia's Nikita Tregubov (1:44.43).

The leader's elder brother Tomass (1:44.54) lies in third, lending a family feel to the current podium make-up.

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