Dubreuil’s 500m podium streak continues with bronze; Bloemen breaks 10,000m track record
CALGARY, ALBERTA – Canada’s long track team earned two more medals at the ISU World Cup Speed Skating in Calgary on Saturday. The trio of Carolina Hiller, Brooklyn McDougall and Ivanie Blondin won their second silver medal of the season in the women’s Team Sprint, while Laurent Dubreuil reached the 500m podium for the fourth consecutive time, bringing home bronze in a closely contested race.
Dubreuil’s opener of 9.58 seconds was only the sixth fastest amongst the field, but the reigning World Champion in the distance made up for it with the afternoon’s second quickest lap time (24.52), which propelled him onto the podium in bronze medal position (34.10).
The two skaters ahead of the Canadian – Jun-Ho Kim of Korea (34.07) and Jordan Stolz of the United States (34.08) – each set personal bests to win gold and silver, respectively. Only five hundredths of a second separated first-place Kim from fourth place Yuma Murakami of Japan.
With his bronze medal today, Dubreuil has now reached the podium in all four 500m races to start the season, winning two gold, one silver and one bronze. The 30-year-old sits comfortably atop the World Cup rankings with 222 points, 36 points ahead of his closest rival.
Canada closed out the day with a silver medal performance from Hiller (Prince George, B.C.), McDougall (Calgary, Alta.) and Blondin (Ottawa, Ont.) in the women’s Team Sprint.
The trio crossed the line in 1:25.73, only 0.05 seconds behind the gold medal winning Americans (1:25.68). The two North American teams were joined on the podium by the Netherlands (1:25.95), who settled for bronze. It was the second silver medal of the season for Canada, who also finished second last month in Heerenveen.
Blondin was also the highest ranked female skater in an individual distance on Saturday, earning a fifth-place finish in the 1500m with a time of 1:54.07. The race was won by Japan’s Miho Takagi (1:52.08), who was joined on the podium by Antoinette Rijpma-de Jong of the Netherlands (+0.62) and Nadezhda Morozova of Kazakhstan (+0.95).
In his first World Cup race of the season, Ted-Jan Bloemen (Calgary, Alta.), who stepped away from competition this fall for the birth of his son, put down an incredible time of 12:33.75 in the B Divison of the men’s 10,000m. In addition to setting a new personal best and Olympic Oval track record, the two-time Olympian was only three seconds away from Nils van der Poel’s world record of 12:30.74. Bloemen’s time would have easily won him gold in the A Division, which was claimed by Davide Ghiotto of Italy (12:45.10).
The ISU World Cup Speed Skating comes to an end tomorrow with the men’s and women’s 1000m and Mass Start. Tickets are still available at www.speedskating.ca – don’t miss your chance to catch the final speed skating races before the holidays
Races will be live streamed on CBC Sports and Radio-Canada Sports. CBC will also have broadcast television coverage starting at 2:00pm ET.
Quotes
It has been a really good start to the season. This is exactly where I want to be, and I think with some rest and more training I can be even better. My goal has always been to be the best in the world, and I’ve always thought the best skater was the one consistently winning World Cup medals, so this medal validates where I see myself right now in the field. People look at the overall season to see who the best is, because that’s the guy that shows up week after week. Winning [World Cup] medals is the main goal, but ultimately the goal is to win the World Championships. I think it’s possible to do both, but we’ll see.
Laurent Dubreuil
“It’s such a fun event. We’re getting use to skating with each other and making the right moves. It was really close to a gold medal, but I think we can be happy about this performance. I’m not a fast sprinter like these two girls [teammates Carolina Hiller and Brooklyn McDougall], so I really have to chase and try to stay with them. Once I’m with them, I feel good. In the last lap, I just put everything on the line and go as hard as I can.
Ivanie Blondin
It feels pretty good. I think we really took advantage of the hometown crowd today. We made some changes that I feel helped us in our race. We’re just chipping away and hoping for gold next time.
Brooklyn McDougall
I think this threesome works perfectly. Brooklyn and I have the start and the speed, so we’re able to pull Ivanie through the first lap, and then she just brings it home at the end. It’s so much fun!
Carolina Hiller
I had to do something right after not being able to show it last week [because of my DQ in the 5000m]. I’ve been feeling very strong and had a really good summer. In general, I felt like the road that I chose has been working out really well. After becoming a dad for the second time, I was really excited to get back into racing. Last week, I didn’t get to show it, so this week everything had to be perfect. I was so determined to show everything I had.
Ted-Jan Bloemen
Results
Women’s 1500m
- Ivanie Blondin: 5th
- Isabelle Weidemann: 14th
- Béatrice Lamarche: 15th
- Alexa Scott: 19th
- Alison Desmarais: 7th (Division B)
Men’s 500m
- Laurent Dubreuil: 3rd
- Christopher Fiola: 19th
- Frank Roth: 6th (Division B)
- Cédrick Brunet: 19th (Division B)
Men’s 10,000m
- Graeme Fish: 8th
- Ted-Jan Bloemen: 1st (Division B)
- Jordan Belchos: 11th (Division B)
Women’s Team Sprint
- Canada: 2nd