Dai Dai Ntab crowned Netherlands' sprint king

The Netherlands held there sprint and allround championships last weekend in Heerenveen.

By Jackob Savard

Photo: Schaats Foto’s

Even though some big names were absent from the championships, there was still great competition for the sprint and allround champion titles.  

A dose of confidence for Dai Dai Ntab

The 500m specialist Dai Dai Ntab was crowned Dutch sprint champion after two 500m and two 1000m races. Hein Otterspeer and Thomas Krol finished second and third. Ntab won the first 500m, finished second in the other 500m and finished fourth in both 1000m races. He was the most constant skater of the top four skaters in this tight competition. This victory will surely give him a little boost after the tough moments he went through during the Dutch olympic selections. Ntab who was one of the favorites to qualify in the 500m was disqualified for two false starts in his only chance to make the olympic team. His victory of the weekend at the Dutch sprint championship will not give him his olympic dream back, but it will surely give him a ton of motivation and confidence for the World sprint championships that will be raced in Changchun, China in March.

De jong near perfect

Letita de Jong offered a near perfect performance to win the ladies' sprint championships. Anice Das who raced an awesome 500m at the Dutch Olympic selection earlier this season finished second and Sanneke de Neeling third.

Bosker and van der Weijden allround champions

With the absence of Sven Kramer and Ireen Wüst, the allround competition was completely open. At the end of the weekend, Marcel Bosker and Annouk van der Wijden finished at the top of the ranking. Lex Dijkstra and Thomas Geerdinck finished second and third in the men’s competition while Linda de Vries and Melissa Wijfje completed the ladies podium.

The World sprint championship will be held in Changchun the 3th and 4th of March and the World allround championship will be raced the following week in Amsterdam.

All the results of the competition are available HERE

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Germany, Norway and Belarus single distances championships

It was national trials weekend! Belarus, Germany and Norway had their single distances championships.

By Jackob Savard

Photos: Schaats Foto’s

In addition to the Dutch championships (you can read our article on the subject by clicking HERE), these three countries also had their national competition this weekend. Here’s a little recap of these events.

Ihle and Beckert will lead the German squad

Nico Ihle and Patrick Beckert were the most dominant skaters of the german trials in Inzell. Ihle was victorious in the 500m and finished second in the 1000m. Beckert was the fastest in the 5000m, 1500m and 10 000m. Roxanne Dufter was the best female athlete of the championships with a victory in the 1500m, a second place on 3000m and a third place in the 1000m.

Bokko, Lorentzen and Pederson still on top for Norway

Hege Bokko was dominant in the norwegian trials winning both 500m races, the 1000m and finishing second in the 1500m. In the men’s competition Håvard Holmefjord Lorentzen also won both 500m races and the 1000m. Sverre Lunde Pedersen was the best long distance skater for the men and won the 1500m, 5000m, and 10 000m.

Even playing field in Belarus

The Belarus single distances championships were really close and different skaters had their moments of glory. Tatyana Mikhailova and Marina Zueva were the most consistent ladies with respectively four and three podiums. Ignat Golovatyuk was the top skater in the men’s competition winning the 500m, 1000m and 1500m distances.

You can find the full results here

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Bergsma et Mantia au top des sélections américaines

Les essais américains pour les Coupes du monde en longue piste se déroulaient cette fin de semaine à Salt Lake City.

Par Jackob Savard Photo de Schaats Foto's

Joey Mantia et Heather Bergsma ont remporté le premier départ groupé lors de la journée de mercredi. Bergsma a continué sa domination sur 500m alors que c’est Mitchell Withmore qui s’est imposé du côté masculin. Emery Lehman gagne le 5000m devant l'infatigable Kc Boutiette. Mia Manganello triomphe au 3000m.

La journée de samedi a été la journée d’Emery Lehman qui a remporté le 10 000m et terminé troisième au 1500m. Carlijn Schoutens remporte le 5000m féminin. Joey Mantia et Heather Bergsma terminent au premier rang sur 1500m et 1000m et gagnent également le deuxième départ en groupe pour conclure les sélections.

Podiums de toutes les distances

Jour 1

Départ en groupe #1 féminin

1. Heather Bergsma

2. Mia Manganello

3. Erin Bartlett

Départ en groupe #1 masculin

1. Joey Mantia

2. Ian Quinn

3. Brian Hansen

Jour 2

500m (1) féminin

1. Heather Bergsma 37.88

2. Sugar Todd 38.40

3. Brittany Bowe 38.43

500m (2) féminin

1. Heather Bergsma 37.88

2. Brittany Bowe 38.06

3. Sugar Todd 38.41

500m (1) masculin

1. Mitch Whitmore 35.04

2. Jonathan Garcia 35.19

3. Kimani Griffin 35.24

500m (2) masculin

1. Mitch Whitmore 34.75

2. Jonathan Garcia 34.89

3. Kimani Griffin 35.31

3000m féminin

1. Mia Manganello 4:07.27

2. Carlijn Schoutens 4:09.15

3. Petra Acker 4:12.78

5000m masculin

1. Emery Lehman 6:28.31

2. KC Boutiette 6:33.99

3. Ian Quinn 6:37.13

Jour 3

1500m féminin

1. Heather Bergsma 1:54.70

2. Brittany Bowe 1:56.51

3. Mia Manganello 1:58.38

1500m masculin

1. Joey Mantia 1:44.15

2. Brian Hansen 1:45.36

3. Emery Lehman 1:46.22

5000m féminin

1. Carlijn Schoutens 7:06.94

2. Petra Acker 7:18.44

3. Maria Lamb 7:22.34

10000m masculin

1. Emery Lehman 13:40.44

2. Theron Sands 14.13.13

3. Chase Reichmann 14:32.16

Jour 4

1000m féminin

1. Heather Bergsma 1:13.91

2. Brittany Bowe 1:13.94

3. Sugar Todd 1:17.25

1000m masculin

1. Joey Mantia 1:08.00

2. Jonathan Garcia 1:08.27

3. Brian Hansen 1:08.86

Départ en groupe #2 féminin

1. Heather Bergsma

2. Mia Manganello

3. Corinne Stoddard

Départ en groupe #2 masculin

1. Joey Mantia

2. Jeffrey Swider-Peltz

3. Chase Reichmann

Résultats complets ICI

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News from the short track technical committee

Photos by Tony Chung @SHORTTRACKHD

Yesterday, Hungarian skater Viktor Knoch, elected athlete member of the ISU short track technical committee, shared some interesting informations related to the new season and beyond.

Dear skaters and friends!

This is my first post as elected athletes Comission member so first of all thank you for your confidence! Here are a couple infos ahead of the season that I would like to share with you.

First and foremost about the padding systems on competitions. The way the ISU works means that any new idea for new rules or rule modification that anyone proposes at this time can only be made official at the next ISU congress that will be held next summer. Therefore there can't be in the rules right now that the competitions have to have the movable padding system. It is planned to have that included in the rules after next congress. That being said, ISU made all kind of efforts to make sure most Events would be on such systems. Some unofficial infos about this years competitions: Budapest will be with the movable system and so will Dordrecht. Shanghai is always with movable pads. The only competition that will be with fixed boards seems to be Seoul as there is no way in that rink to install movable pads. Dresden (European championships) is looking into installing a hybrid system. That means the crash zones would be movable and the straights with fixed board. Keep in mind these are unofficial infos.

Some words about the referees. The Short Track Technical Committee had a hard time so far recognizing what decision came from which official as there was no paper trail from it. They implemented a system with the iPads where the referees have to mark their decision and the ISU can later see which decisions were unanimous and which ones cause some troubles. This means that they can identify the problematic situations and guide the referees into the same direction. The referees will also be getting a compensation starting this season. This is really important as we want professional referees and we want the best ones we can get.

My third topic here will be about a new discipline the ISU is working on and why they chose this type to try. The basic idea is a mix gender team event that would include individual racing, team time trial and mix gender relay. If you watched other various sports at the olympics or just world championships you can see that there are mix gender events in a lot of them. That's a general idea of the IOC (international Olympic committee) and they are the ones who will have to agree on the new event. The IOC deadline for ideas of new events is too close at this point to start exploring completely new ideas, so there are two options now. We try out this event this year and if people like it and it works then there's a chance that it could be included in the next olympics in China. If it doesn't work for some reason then there will be no new event there. Also why this mix gender team event is good for the IOC is that it doesn't need additional skaters at the games or any addition days for short track, and it only means one new medals. IOC is very strict generally about the number of medals and number of athletes in different sports so there's a good chance that they will like this mix gender team event and have it included at the games. An official test Event will happen in Montreal on the Tuesday before the worlds and the Short track technical Committee hopes that many teams will participate with their relay and substitute skaters.

Thank you for reading and please like and share so it can reach as many skaters as possible. Also if you have any questions, don't be afraid to ask in the comments or as a private message.

Viktor Knoch
athlete member
Short track technical committee

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Big weekend in the world of short track speed skating

(Carl Savard)

A lot of action for our first weekend of activity here at Passion/Speed/Skating as two major short track events are taking place. First of all, the sixty-four best skaters in Canada (32 women and 32 men)  will be fighting for the right to represent Canada at the World Championship that will take place in Rotterdam, Netherlands on March ten through twelve.

For some of them like Charles Hamelin, Marianne St-Gelais or Valerie Maltais it's a weekend they are accustom too, for others like Catherine Mailloux, Samuel Gallant and Léa Tessier, this is their biggest competition to date and they will surely fight and learn a lot from it.

We will be following the action LIVE at the Maurice-Richard arena starting tomorrow afternoon and if you are in the Montreal area this weekend, you should definitely come and see this. Tickets are only 5$ per day or 10$ for the three days. Don't miss it. If you can't be there, make sure to follow us on Facebook. The link is up here in the menu bar.

As for overseas, the European Championships will crown a new champion for sure on the women side because back to back champion Elise Christie from Great Britain won't be there. Her and her coach have decided it would be better for her to start preparing for the World Championships. She wants that world title and wants to focus on that. Her absence opens up the podium for skaters such as Arianna Fontana who's back after a year off or upcoming star Suzanne Schulting who just won the Dutch Championships. On the men side, battle will be intense between the likes of Sjinkie Knegt, Semen Elistratov and the brothers from Hungary, Liu Shaolin Sandor and Liu Shaohang.

If we can't update you live, we will surely report on the event afterward. Stay tuned!  

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