St-Gelais and Canada enjoy golden day at Dordrecht World Cup
BySportsbeat
Published 26/10/2017 at 10:20 GMT
There were celebrations for three-time Olympic silver medallist Marianne St-Gelais as she led home a Canada one-two in the women's 500m A final at the latest World Cup in Dordrecht.
Canada's Marianne St-Gelais (2) and Valérie Maltais (47), Korea's Shim Suk Hee (3) and Kim A-Lang (128), Russia's Yulia Shishkina (71) and Ekaterina Efremenkova (63)
Image credit: Getty Images
The 27-year-old was in dominant mood in the Netherlands, quickly over-hauling team-mate Kim Boutin before finishing in 43.093 seconds.
The latter crossed the line in 43.149 while Italy's Martina Valcepina took the bronze ahead of home favourite Yara van Kerkhof who fell early in the race.
St-Gelais said:
You have to think about PyeongChang 2018 every move, every step is for the Games. We don't have many races left against our opponents, so when you have the shot, you have to take it. I like it, I like having the Games in mind. I wake up every morning knowing it is my last shot. It doesn't stress me, it gives me wings. I don't want any regrets.
There were a number of key absentees in the final too with last week's Budapest winner Choi Min Jeong penalised in the semi-final and missing out on the medal race.
Overall World Champion Elise Christie was also unable to start her quarter-final earlier in the day due to an injury.
"I hurt my thigh racing last weekend (in Budapest) and I haven't been able to skate really," said Christie, who fell in her opening 1500m semi-final. "It's very weak. It hurts as soon as I go in the racing position. I tried but I couldn't do it."
The men's 500m A final went the way of Canada's Samuel Girard who beat Dutch skater Sjinkie Knegt in a winning time of 40.767 with Korea's Hwang Dae Heon third.
The latter visited the medal rostrum on two occasions on Saturday having also jumped out of the pack in the closing stages to take gold in the men's 1500m A final.
The Korean took full advantage of the absence of team-mate Lim Hyo-Jun, who won gold in this event in the World Cup opener in Budapest last week, and finished ahead of Shaolin Sandor Liu from Hungary and Canada's Charles Hamelin.
Meanwhile in the women's 1500m final, Choi picked up from where she left off last week by taking the gold.
She claimed all three individual gold medals in the season-opening event and never looked in danger of being beat again as she finished in 2:31.334.
Silver went to Canada's Valerie Maltais with Korea's Shim Suk Hee third.
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