Speedskating veteran pleased with podium finish

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This article was published 24/01/2021 (1716 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The Beijing Winter Olympics are more than a year away but Heather McLean served noticed she should be a serious medal threat with a standout performance at an ISU World Cup long-track speedskating event in Heerenveen, Netherlands, on the weekend.

McLean raced to a fourth-place finish in the women’s 500 metres Sunday, following a bronze medal at the same distance a day earlier, clocking a time of 37.522 — just 0.11 seconds off the podium.

She trailed only gold medallist Femke Kok of the Netherlands and a pair of Russians — silver medallist Angelina Golikova and third-place finisher Olga Fatkulina.

Four hours later, the 28-year-old Winnipegger wrapped up the competition with an 11th-place showing in the 1,000 metres. Her time of 1:15.511 time was 1.90 seconds behind winner Brittany Bowe of the U.S.

“It was one of the best all-around weekends I’ve had in quite a few years,” said McLean by telephone. “I’m really happy with another solid 500. I really knew I had it in me to get in that top five again so I’m happy with the fourth place. There were a couple of small errors, ones that I can fix for next weekend.”

Another World Cup event is scheduled for next weekend in Heerenveen with national teams from around the globe stationed in a bubble setting for racing at the 12,000-seat Thialf-hal, although fans are not permitted in the building.

“That was very exciting for me as a coach,” said Canadian assistant coach Shannon Rempel. “I’m just thrilled for Heather and for all the athletes that have gone through this season and all the challenges that they’ve had and just being able to execute. I was so excited for her and loved seeing her reaction and how excited she was when she crossed the line.”

The Canadians, who came into the event with limited on-ice training due to a facility closure at their Calgary training base and without having competed at home or internationally for the previous 10 months, were at a serious disadvantage. Yet they still walked away with five medals, despite facing European teams with healthy competitive schedules in 2020-21.

McLean, an eight-year veteran of the national team who ended a five-year World Cup individual podium drought Saturday, was psyched about her performance in her preferred race — the 500 — but felt she had a breakthrough in the 1,000.

“I was actually really happy with the 1,000 race, which has been challenging for me especially at this oval,” she said. “I’ve kind of gotten the hang of that race at Calgary or Salt Lake (ovals), but racing in the Thialf has always been really tough for me. So today, I think I broke through a little bit of a barrier and I’m looking forward to racing them again next weekend.”

McLean said adjusting to ice conditions was crucial.

“I think my technique favours ice that has a little bit more glide to it,” she said, noting that the ovals in Salt Lake City and Calgary fit that description. “I have to make a couple small adjustments to my skating style to benefit me skating here and I think I made those adjustments today.”

On Sunday, McLean had a four-hour break between races. The longer wait was less than ideal, making the transition from the 500 metres to 1,000 metres trickier.

“For the 500 that you’re really pushing the limits to what your body can do — you want max power,” she explained. “It’s a really short amount of time so you can kind of sustain that but for the 1,000, you need to dial it back a little bit. It’s more controlled power and I’m really finding it hard to skate at 98 per cent.

“I can skate at 100 per cent or I can skate at 80 per cent but for me to find that in between — we call it ‘easy speed’ — is challenging for me.”

McLean said Friday’s medal wins — a gold by the women’s team pursuit and a bronze by the men — lifted the entire squad.

“Having them on the podium smiling, having fun, really set the tone for the whole weekend,” she said.

Rempel said the difficult training circumstances made for a rewarding show by the Canadians.

“We had no way to really gauge where they’re at, so it was really a big unknown coming into this weekend,” said Rempel. “We knew they were prepared physically in terms of where we wanted them to be in the lab… but skating fitness and racing experience is different.

“They weren’t really prepared as well as they normally are for a World Cup so it was a bit of a surprise that they came out on the first weekend and executed races that were good enough for the podium.”

mike.sawatzky@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @sawa14