Two local speedskaters crowned champions

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This article was published 13/04/2022 (1509 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

RIVER HEIGHTS

BRIDGWATER

Two amateur speedskaters sped their way to the top of the podium recently.

Adam Buchwald, 16, and Skylar Van Horne, 14, were crowned overall champions at 2022 Canadian Youth Short Track (West) championships, held March 25 to 27 at the Selkirk Recreation Complex. The event was hosted by Speed Skating Manitoba and welcomed young athletes between the ages of 11 and 15 from across western Canada.

After two cancelled events owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, both Buchwald and Van Horne were thrilled to be competing again.

“It was hard not to have the motivation of a competition through all the training, but it was great to still have the team,” Bridgwater resident Van Horne said. “Even if we were online, we were all training together in our basements, or if we were outside and social distanced it was still fun and made it a little bit easier to train through COVID as a group.”

Van Horne got involved with speedskating because her father also competed when he was a child. She trains six days a week, sometimes twice a day, and hopes to make either the short track or long track team at next year’s Canada Winter Games.

Van Horne’s hard work has paid off so far. At the Canadian Youth Short Track Championships, she earned gold medals in the 400-metre, 1,500-metre and 3,000-metre races, as well as a silver medal for the 200-metre race in the T2T 14 girls category.

“I’m motivated and I put in the hard work I need to,” she said. “You have to believe in yourself and be able to work through any struggles you have during a race or during a hard day of training. I always have a strategy before a race because if you go in with nothing usually it doesn’t go your way.”

For Adam Buchwald, speedskating has also become a family affair. He joined the sport 12 years ago because his mother was a coach and his older sisters also competed.

The Canadian Youth Short Track championships was the culmination of this season’s hard work. Despite not competing in two years, Buchwald earned individual gold medals in the 400-metre, 1,500-metre and 3,000-metre points race in the T2T 15 boys category.

“I really enjoy the sport and I enjoy competing,” Buchwald said. “This was my first time winning an overall championship and it felt great. It was nice to get back into competition after COVID and not having much for the last two years.”

Like most young athletes, Buchwald has his sights set on the Olympics.

“As for more short-term goals, I’d really like to make the junior national team next year,” he said.