Friedrich won the four-man and two-man World Cup titles last season, becoming the first ever athlete to win all of the season's races in the two-man event.

A total of 35 bobsleigh teams and 52 skeleton athletes from 23 nations are registered to compete at this International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation event in Canada.

Infront, the IBSF's exclusive media and marketing partner, has reached agreements with broadcasters across more than 60 territories to cover the weekend's action.

Jamanka, who won her first overall World Cup and World Championship titles last winter, will be spearheading Germany's challenge once again, although there will be new German athletes involved this season in the form of the current under-23 world champion Kim Kalicki and Laura Nolte, the 2016 Youth Olympic champion.

Kalicki will compete in her first World Cup races in Lake Placid, while Nolte makes her début in January for the race on her home track in Winterberg.

The women's bobsleigh event will be completed tomorrow.

There will be two-man bob racing both tomorrow and Sunday.

One familiar face returning to the World Cup will be bobsleigh pilot Kaillie Humphries, who missed last season.

The 34-year-old, who won Olympic gold for Canada in 2010 and 2014 and also won two World Championship titles and four overall World Cups, has been competing for the United States since the start of the season.

Skeleton world champions Martins Dukurs of Latvia and Tina Hermann of Germany will also get their season underway in Lake Placid, as will South Korea's Pyeongchang 2018 gold medallist Yun Sung-bin.

Russia's Alexander Tretiakov and Elena Nikitina will be starting the defence of their World Cup titles.

Tretiakov and Nikitina had their respective Sochi 2014 gold and bronze medals stripped from them in the wake of investigations into the Russian doping scandal at the Games, but regained them following a successful appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport on February 1 2018.

The women's skeleton competition will take place tomorrow, with the men's version scheduled for Sunday.

Bobsleigh athletes who won't be competing in the 2019/2020 season due to injury include Chris Spring and Alysia Rissling of Canada, and the World Championship bronze medallist in the two-man bobsleigh, Nico Walther of Germany.

Olympic silver medallist Elana Meyers Taylor of the United States is also taking a break this season,

The 2015 and 2017 world champion is expecting her first child in March 2020.