Local skaters have big weekend at speed skating meet
Makena Duncan used the hometown ice to her advantage during this weekend's Medicine Hat Short Track speed skating meet at the Family Leisure Centre.
The nine-year-old speed skater raced her way to a bronze medal in the 10-competitor Division 6 class after collecting 2,109 points and two heat victories — including a win in the 200-metre final.
“It’s pretty exciting,” said Duncan. “Besides the medals my favourite thing would be getting on the ice and letting the audience see you going fast. I also like the turning left.”
Duncan was joined by local Junior skaters Jacob Krueger, Kaeden Witkowski and Laura Ebel, who all placed on the podium in their three-competitor division.
Krueger took gold after winning the 1,000-metre in 1:40.180, the 1,500 metre in 2:34.280 and the 500-metre in 47.730 seconds. Witkowski earned silver after placing second in all three events, while Ebel settled for bronze.
Corbin Desrochers earned a fifth place finish in Division 6 with 1,752 points collected in six races. Aiden Currah placed sixth in Division 3 after collecting 1,101 points across six races, including a victory in the 400-metre final. Anders Currah also earned a sixth place finish in Division 4 with 1,121 points in six races.
“Lots of them have been getting some personal best times,” said Medicine Hat Speed Skating Club coach Jala Foster. “They’ve been skating fantastically in technical, we’ve worked on passes this weekend. And we’ve had some of our older skaters who are getting very close to getting onto the Alberta development team.”
Foster added developing skaters need to be able to skate in a competitive format like the weekend’s meet in order to fully learn and incorporate a number of technical skills into their repertoire. While the basics must be taught in a practice environment, some things can really only be taught in a race.
“Learning to pass, learning to be aggressive and learning how to start against other kids their age is something they can only learn from this,” she said. “I can put them against other kids in practice, but really these kids skate so close to their speed that they can only learn that stuff at competitions.”
And they’ve been doing just that. Foster says many of her young skaters have taken great strides in a number of areas through the two-day event, which opened the competitive season for the club.
“They’ve all been doing really well. They’ve come a long way just throughout the weekend,” said Foster. “They’ve been learning passes I can’t team them except for places like this, and how to be aggressive.”
Foster says the club has been growing steadily over the past few years, but she hopes to see it increase in popularity even more this year. In an effort to bring more young athletes into the sport, the club has opted to waive registration fees for new members this season.
“We’re getting way more young kids, way more learn-to-skate. We always want more little kids so we can teach them from the bottom up,” said Foster. “It’s nice to see them really come along and improve and get different technical abilities.”