Round up: November 29, 2017

By Carl Savard

Photo by Tony Chung (@SHORTTRACKHD)

Cheyenne Goh at the Olympics and all the other spots awarded in short track

With the World cup season in the books, ISU announced how many spots each country were able to secure for the upcoming Pyeongchang Olympic games. The two main surprises are linked to Canada and Singapore. The Canadian men’s team was not able  to qualify for the maximum number of spots on 500m, getting two spots out of a possible three. As for Singapore, young skater Cheyenne Goh will be the first athlete in history to represent Singapore in the Winter olympic games. Goh won a spot on 1500m based on her results from the Shanghai World cup events a few weeks back. It will be quite an experience for the young skater living in Alberta, Canada. “So far the plan is to train in Singapore with our national coach but things aren’t confirmed yet. It’s pretty surreal... I still can’t really believe it. I will definitely embrace this experience.”

To see how many spots each country was able to secure, click HERE

Short track: New padding measures to increase safety for skaters

In an article written back in September we shared a letter sent by Viktor Knoch about eventual rules changes in the padding measures in arenas holding short track competitions at the international level. Some new rules will be effective on June 1st, 2018. The main thing you have to know is that the Olympic games (starting from Beijing 2022) will need complete moveable padding without boards. When it comes to ISU championships, ISU World cup or Winter youth Olympics, organisers will be able to chose whether they will use a fully moveable padding system or a hybrid one with covered boards in less risky spots. Other international competition of A or B qualiber of senior or junior categories will have to chose between hybrid and traditional while Junior C or D level can go with basic padding.

To get all the details click HERE

Short track: Canada at the Shanghai cup

After shuffling the deck of cards and tightening the finances following a season where they had difficulties sending athletes to all the major events last season, it was quite a sigh of relief to see Canada represented at the Shanghai Cup last week. Even though it is not part of the World cup season, as big as the Olympics or World championships, a lot of really strong skaters were there and it was an amazing opportunity for Canada’s B team to battle against strong opposition and gather some experience. Let’s hope this and the Winter Universiade will never be left out of Canada’s schedule ever again.

To see the full results click HERE