HAMELIN'S WEEKEND GOLD SHOWS HE'S ON TRACK FOR OLYMPICS
With 37 world championship speedskating medals, Charles Hamelin has now won as many as Russia, Hungry, Australia, Poland and Belgium combined.
He has been to 17 world championships and owns almost 18 per cent of Canada's impressive 207-medal historical output, which ranks second only to the powerhouse Koreans with 254.
So the 36-year-old from Sainte-Julie, Que. has established his numerical standing in the fast-paced, rough-andtumble world of short track speedskating, and when he says the absence of Chinese, Korean and Japanese skaters from this year's world championships does not diminish the 1,500-metre gold medal he won on Saturday in Dordrecht, Netherlands, he deserves the benefit of the doubt.
“Well, for sure it's a different world championship because they're not there. The Chinese, the Koreans, the Japanese are really strong skaters in world championship competition,” Hamelin said Sunday during a Zoom call with Canadian media.
“As I said before, there was still a title to go get and I was there to get it. I'm 100 per cent sure that I would have been as successful with all the other skaters (in attendance) because the people who were here that won other distances and won the world title overall, they beat the Korean and the Chinese ... so if I can beat them, I can beat the Korean, I can beat the Chinese.”
He beat the Liu brothers of Hungary, as Shaolin finished fourth and Shaoang was seventh in the 1,500 metres. They came back to get the best of Hamelin in the 1,000-metres, however, as Shaolin took gold and his brother silver. Shaoang had the last laugh, however, finishing ahead of his brother in the overall to give Hungary its first championship.
Since 2000, Korean skaters have won 14 men's overall titles at the worlds. The others went to China (two), the U.S., Hamelin in 2018 and now Hungary. On the women's side, Korea has dominated with 11 overall titles since 2000, China has seven, the Netherlands two and Great Britain one.
Courtney Sarault of Moncton finished a surprising second overall in the women's competition on the weekend, collecting silver in the 1,500-metres and 3,000-metres and a bronze in the 1,000-metres, her first ever worlds medals. Only Suzanne Schulting of the Netherlands had a better meet than Sarault as she won her second overall title.
Hamelin said his gold medal ranks behind only the two he won in Montreal in 2018 en route to his first and only overall world title.
“I would put the 1,500-metres in Montreal and the 1,000-metres in Montreal in 2018 one and two. (They were) the two medals that made me world champion in 2018. The moment that I had on the ice during those races was just amazing and for me it was the perfect moment.”
He was competitive throughout the weekend in Dordrecht and leaves with confidence that he will be a factor a year from now at the Beijing Olympics.
“It just shows that with all the work we did, with all the difficulties we had during the time with COVID and everything, we were able to put in a good amount of work. I got better. I got better technically and I got better physically. I am 100 per cent sure that it's only the beginning.”