CALGARY — The Canadian men’s long-track speedskating team won gold in the team pursuit Friday on the final day of the Four Continents speedskating championship.
Calgary’s Ted-Jan Bloemen, Toronto’s Hayden Mayeur and Kaleb Muller of Cranford, Alta., crossed the finish line in three minutes 37.22 seconds – well ahead of the next closest team.
Kazakhstan (3:51.59) finished more than 14 seconds behind Canada. South Korea (3:54.37) won bronze.
The Canadian women – Regina’s Kali Christ, Winnipeg’s Lindsey Kent and Laura Hall of Salmon Arm, B.C. – were second in their team pursuit (3:08.69), finishing half a second behind the first-place Americans (3:08.19). South Korea came in third (3:30.62).
Christ also added a second podium finish – a bronze medal in the women’s 1,000-metre event. She posted a time of 1:16.51, beating out Kazakhstan’s Yekaterina Aidov (1:15.49) and Yu-Ting Huang of Taiwan (1:14.46).
Christ, a two-time Olympian, finished the three-day competition with four medals. She also won gold in the women’s 1,500 and a bronze in the team sprint.
“I feel really good,” said Christ. “Medals aside, I’ve started feeling like myself again this week. I’m actually able to transfer the technical advice that I’m getting in practice into my racing. It’s going really well and that’s showing up in my times."
Bloemen, Muller and Mayeur all won three medals each in the competition.
The next event for Canada’s long-track speed skating team is the Olympic skate-off beginning Dec. 27 in Quebec City.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 17, 2021.
The Canadian Press
