Canada's (very tall) short track star could own the world championships

Jesse Campigotto · CBC Sports

· Posted: Mar 13, 2025 5:23 PM EDT | Last Updated: 6 minutes ago

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What a week to beryllium a velocity skating fan!

The satellite single-distances championships for agelong way skaters began contiguous successful Norway, wherever the Canadian trio of Brooklyn McDougall, Béatrice Lamarche and Ivanie Blondin took metallic successful the women's squad sprint.

Canada finished sixth successful the men's squad sprint. At past year's satellite championships successful Calgary, Canada won golden successful some events en way to capturing a national-record 10 medals.

Blondin besides placed eighth successful the women's 3,000 metres today, close down Canadians Valerie Maltais and Isabelle Weidemann, who were sixth and seventh. Canada's Ted-Jan Bloemen and Graeme Fish were seventh and 13th, respectively, successful the men's 5,000m.

Meanwhile, the champion abbreviated way skaters are successful Beijing for their satellite championships, which commencement Friday with qualifying rounds for the medal races connected Saturday and Sunday. Canadians volition beryllium successful contention for plentifulness of hardware aft racking up a full of 37 medals crossed the six World Tour stops this season, including 21 gold, to springiness Canada a comfy triumph implicit the Netherlands and Italy for the squad championship.

WATCH | Canada claims women's team sprint silver:

The apical Canadian to ticker is Will Dandjinou, who's poised to beryllium a large prima astatine adjacent year's Winter Olympics successful Italy aft missing the chopped for the 2022 Games. Unusually gangly for a short-tracker, the 23-year-old from Sherbrooke, Que., stands 6-foot-3 without skates, stretching acold beyond the 5-foot-9 framework helium figures is perfect for his sport. "There's nary blueprint for america gangly guys," Dandjinou said successful a recent interview.

But he's intelligibly made his comparative lankiness enactment for him. Dandjinou won golden successful the 1,000m astatine past year's satellite championships, and this play he's been the astir ascendant short-tracker connected the planet, winning a global-high 8 idiosyncratic races connected the World Tour to seizure his archetypal men's wide title on with the 1,000m and 1,500m titles. Dandjinou besides helped Canada to the men's relay rubric and finished 2nd successful the 500m to his teammate Steven Dubois, giving Canada a cleanable expanse of the 5 men's World Tour crystal globes. Here's much connected Dandjinou's rise from CBC Sports' Devin Heroux.

Dubois is different feline to ticker this week successful Beijing. He captured a implicit acceptable of Olympic medals — golden successful the relay, metallic successful the 1,500 and bronze successful the 1,000 — connected this aforesaid crystal aboveground astatine the 2022 Winter Games. The 27-year-old has yet to triumph a satellite title, but helium earned a brace of idiosyncratic medals astatine the 2023 worlds successful the short-track hotbed of Seoul earlier missing the podium past twelvemonth successful the Netherlands.

On the women's side, Canada volition look to upgrade its relay bronze from past year's worlds aft tying Italy for apical spot successful the World Tour standings. The apical Canadians successful the women's wide pursuit were Danae Blais and Florence Brunelle, who placed seventh and eighth. Blais finished 3rd successful the 1,000m standings portion Brunelle was 3rd successful the 500m.

Four-time Olympic idiosyncratic medallist Kim Boutin, who won her archetypal satellite rubric past twelvemonth successful the 500m, finished 13th successful the wide pursuit this season. But she did assistance Canada spot 2nd successful the mixed relay and should person a changeable astatine the podium successful that lawsuit this weekend.

The afloat database of Canadians astatine the abbreviated way worlds:

Men

William Dandjinou: 500m, 1,000m, 1,500m
Steven Dubois: 500m, 1,000m
Maxime Laoun: 1,500m
Jordan Pierre-Gilles: 500m
Félix Roussel: 1,000m, 1500m

Women

Danaé Blais: 1,000m, 1,500m
Kim Boutin: 500m
Florence Brunelle: 500m, 1,000m, 1,500m
Rikki Doak: 500m
Courtney Sarault: 1,000m, 1,500m

Each Canadian skater is besides eligible to vie successful relays.

How to watch:

Every medal contention volition beryllium streamed unrecorded connected CBCSports.ca and CBC Gem, starting astatine 2 a.m. ET connected some Saturday and Sunday. Here's the afloat docket of events.