Altenberg raced bobsleigh as early as 1908 on a natural track going downhill. By the late 1970s, the East Germans were already successful in luge, and had increasing success in bobsleigh. This included a total of six Winter Olympic medals in bobsleigh in 1976 and 1980, along with five world bobsleigh championship medals between 1977 and 1979. In order to increase East Germany's effort to win more bobsleigh and luge medals both at the Winter Olympics and their respective sport's world championships, a track was constructed. The track at Altenberg was constructed under the order of then-Stasi (Ministry for State Security in East Germany) Minister Erich Mielke.