Pierre Lueders and team (CP)

Lueders leads Canada to first gold in 4-man bobsleigh.

St. Moritz, SUI-Canada's Pierre Lueders dominated the St. Moritz track, winning his first-ever four-man World Cup victory on European soil in Switzerland on Sunday.

Lueders blazed down the world's only natural track with lightening quick speed, posting the two fastest runs of the day and setting a track record in his second run to win by 0.19 seconds. The 1998 Olympic gold medallist led his four-man crew to gold with a two-run combined time of two minutes 09.51.

"This was one of my last remaining goals, which was to try and win a four-man race in Europe," said Lueders, who equaled his best-ever World Cup four-man result on a European track with last week's silver medal win in Torino, Italy. "Day's like today confirm that we're right on track of where we'd like to be. It shows we're ready to compete in the four-man this year, and the next."

Lueders secured his gold medal victory with Morgan Alexander of Calgary, Ken Kotyk of Canora, Sask., and Lascelles Brown, Calgary, who is a new recruit from the Jamaican program. The Canada 1 team posted runs of 1:05.02 and 1:04.49 respectively, and picked up speeds of up to 146 kilometres an hour.

"The crew did a great job today. They were under enormous pressure to perform well and they pulled through with some powerful starts," said Lueders. "You get some momentum going and the next thing you know winning becomes a habit, which is something you need leading into the Olympic year."

Joining the Canadian team on the podium to grab the silver medal was Russian powerhouse Alexandr Zoubkov, who is currently leading the World Cup campaign with 525 points and five podium finishes. The German 2 sled led by Leonard Sanktjohanser, rounded out third to take the bronze medal.

On Saturday, Lueders secured his third World Cup silver medal in as many days with brakeman Lascelles Brown, a new recruit from Jamaica, to post a two-run combined time of two minutes 13.13 seconds. "I thought we had a great opportunity to win the race, but my clumsiness at the start slowed us down a bit," said the Edmonton, Alta., native, who has also picked up two podium finishes this season in World Cup four-man. "It's a little disappointing giving away a win, but all things considered, we're having a great season and I hope things continue to prove successful."

Canada 2 pilot Jayson Krause of Okatoks, Alta., earned his second of three Olympic qualifying results, sliding into 10th place with brakeman Florian Linder, Morrin, Alta., to post a two-run combined time of 2:14.21. "It is always good to have another qualification out of the way," said Krause, who posted his best-ever finish of sixth place at the season-opening World Cup event in Winterberg, Germany in November. "Consistency has been an issue with me. The potential is there, we just have to put down two solid runs and it will come."

Sunday's gold medal win puts Lueders second overall in four-man World Cup standings with 460 points, followed by Martin Annen of Switzerland in third at 455 points.

Canada 2 pilot Jayson Krause piloted his sled into 21st spot with Serge Despres, Cocagne, NB, Nathan Cunningham, Calgary, and Florian Linder of Morrin, Alta. The 28-year-old, who is coming off a top-10 finish at Saturday's two-man race, finished the day with a time of 1:06.82.

Jenn Heil (CP)

Heil captures first-ever World Cup dual mogul gold!

PARK CITY , Utah -- Jennifer Heil of Montreal QC, captured her first-ever, dual moguls World Cup victory, while securing her third World Cup mogul victory this season. "I'm so excited,” said Heil, the 21 year old native of Spruce Grove, Alta. “It's my first dual win (on the World Cup circuit) ever and I did it with my best skiing ever.” "I was just so motivated from the last competition, where things didn’t go the way I had wanted.” added Heil.

She was referring to her fourth-place finish in Thursday's individual moguls final when she had the finest turn scores of her World Cup career, yet finished fourth. Heil felt primed for a good showing in Saturday's duals. After several losses -- in all previous duals against superstar Kari Traa of Norway -- Heil outskied Traa in the semi-finals to reach the gold medal final.

"I knew I couldn't make any mistakes against Kari, so I just pushed out of the gate as hard as I could,” said Heil of the start to her hardest dual on Saturday. In the gold-medal dual, Heil defeated Hannah Kearney of the U.S. to clinch her fourth medal of the season. Heil qualified third for the round of 16 of this Chevrolet Freestyle International event, and then won all four of her duals. She knocked off Tae Satoya of Japan, then Margarita Marbler of Austria, Traa and Kearney.

Kearney left with the silver medal and Nikola Sudova of the Czech Republic defeated Traa to win the bronze-medal dual. Elisa Kurylowicz of Manotick, Ont., emerged ninth, Kristi Richards of Summerland, B.C., 13th and Stéphanie St. Pierre of Victoriaville, Que., 15th.

In collecting her fourth World Cup medal of the season, Heil remains the overall moguls’ leader with 466 points, well ahead of runner-up Sudova. Other Canadians were Sylvia Kerfoot of Vancouver in 19th and Jennifer Simm of Prince George, B.C., in 30th.

After winning five of six possible medals in Thursday's World Cup event, the Americans continued their strong moguls showing by qualifying seven for the men's round of 16 Saturday. For the fifth straight World Cup, an American was atop the men's moguls’ podium, this time with Jeremy Bloom's second successive World Cup triumph. Bloom bettered Dale Begg-Smith of Australia in the gold-medal dual, to leave Begg-Smith second. Janne Lahtela of Finland was third, winning the bronze-medal dual over Rusian Sharifulin of Russia.

Chris Wong of Prince George, B.C., was 30 th in the overall standings entering Saturday's contest, but finished seventh, for the third top-10 World Cup showing of his career Pierre-Alexandre Rousseau of Drummondville and Marc-André Moreau of Chambly, Que., often challenge for berths in the final, but neither started, due to injury. However, each will travel to Japan to compete next weekend.

The other Canadian men competing Saturday were Garrett Simm of Prince George in 20th, Jean-François Therrien of Laval, Que., 37th, Warren T anner of Grimsby, Ont., 38th and Vincent Marquis of Ste. Foy, Que., 41st.
The World Cup circuit resumes with events in Japan and China next weekend.

Dale Henwood

The Big Picture with Dale Henwood: Is success in sport dependent on garnering political support?

There seems to be wide support for the notion that the sport community needs an overhaul of its’ organizational mindset. Many successful businesses over the decades (Chrysler in the 1970’s, General Electric in the 1980’s, Continental Airlines in the 1990’s and NASA in the 2000’s) have gone through very significant organizational changes. Along the same lines, sport in Canada is in need of a reformed culture in order to become internationally successful over the long term.

As an example, the high performance programming aspects of the Canadian Sport Policy could be contracted to a new corporation until 2012. This arms length sport corporation would develop a clear plan that is well communicated, set ambitious performance targets, establish a strategy for achieving them and accept responsibility for the results.

To start the process the sport community needs to become much more politically attuned. Having just participated in three elections in the past 6 months (federal election June 28th, municipal election October 18th and Alberta provincial election November 22th) I continue to be disturbed by our political process.

The sport community must become more politically active in order to be heard. The efforts of the Sport Matter Group and Sport Alberta must be applauded in this regard. The “cult of non-involvement” that often permeates the sport community must change. We need to be bold and professional, but we also need to “inflict pain” on those who do not support our efforts. Our area of political activism is sport. We need to hold the politicians – at all levels – accountable for their actions in support of sport or lack thereof. Presently, it is apparent that it is simply lip service that is paid to the sport community. Politicians often talk about the many values and benefits of sport but they are sadly lacking regarding their commitment to action.

We need to remind the politician they are elected to serve, not to rule. Together (we and they) need to think of the next generation, not the next election. As in the business world, we need to make both short term and long term decisions but we must have clear objectives and be anchored in the long term. If not, short term agendas such as personal bonuses, stock options, political grandstanding or photo ops become prominent. Sport is a long term business, whether at the level of health and quality of life or for high performance results. Flat lined funding or one time/one year funding announced several times is not conducive to sustained international performance.

Leadership for such reform must come from the sport community. “We the people” must lead and not let a few elected representatives tell us what is best. The new sport agency can lead the charge. We need to share our interest, our passion, our knowledge with others around us to influence them to commit to action. What will your role be?

Dale Henwood
President,
Canadian Sport Centre Calgary

Beckie Scott (CP)

BECKIE SCOTT STEALS SHOW WINNING SWISS SPRINT.

Pontresina, SUI-Beckie Scott quickly found her way back onto an international podium after winning an invitational sprint event in Pontresina, Switzerland on Wednesday.

The event, which included the best cross-country skiers from Canada, Germany and Switzerland, was held in the downtown streets of Pontresina. The Canadian Team participated in the event due to a two-week break in World Cup action.

Scott of Vermilion, Alta., who has had solid results since returning to the World Cup circuit in January, posted the fastest qualifying time heading into the final heats which consist of four athletes racing head-to-head on the 1.1 kilometre track. The top-two athletes in each heat move on to the next round. "It was a very successful day on a good, solid sprint course," said Scott, who cruised her way to the finals. "It was a great measuring stick for me leading into World Championships against a very talented field of athletes."

Scott's Olympic and World Cup teammate, Sara Renner of Canmore, Alta., also had a successful day. Renner powered through the heats until the semifinals where she finished out of the top two. However, the two-time Olympian quickly rebounded to win the consolation final and finish fifth.

Edmonton's Tara Whitten, who is enjoying her rookie season on the World Cup, also competed in the women's event on Wednesday, and finished 15th.

Drew Goldsack of Red Deer, Alta. was the top Canuck in the men's division after winning the consolation final. "Things went really well for me today and it was definitely my kind of course with tight corners and really fast conditions," said Goldsack. "I have had a tough year so this will help my confidence. It is fun to be here with the Canadian team and to see us do well as a group is really encouraging."

Veronika Bauer (CP)

Bauer and Omischl take to the podium while Shouldice serves notice.

Park City, Utah – Veronika Bauer of Toronto moved from fourth in the opening round to collect a silver medal, while Steve Omischl of North Bay, Ont., moved up from fifth to capture a bronze medal at the Chevrolet Freestyle International in Deer Valley, Utah last night . Warren Shouldice of Calgary placed fourth, but served notice to his competitors by performing the first ever Lay-triple-full-full (quadruple twisting triple back flip with three twists in the second flip) in competition.

For Bauer, it was her second medal of the season after earning a bronze medal a week ago in Fernie, B.C. A triple-twisting double somersault in the final clinched the medal for Bauer, who had stayed away from the jump after crashing the same jump during summer training. "I'm just not one to get over that type of thing easily. Others crash and go right back up and try again," admitted Bauer, 25.

However, she says Friday's result has her over the frustration of trying lower difficulty jumps that made her feel she couldn't be competitive. "Now I have the DD (degree of difficulty) to win and it feels so good. I feel competitive again," said Bauer, who now sits fourth in the season's overall aerials standings

Nina Li of China is also improving, winning her third World Cup of the year and third in her last four starts. Li produced a winning score of 191.30 to move into a tie for first in the season's overall standings. The Chinese jumper shares the lead with Lydia Ierodiaconou of Australia, who scraped into the final as the last qualifier, but made up lost ground to finish third in Friday's final.

Amber Peterson of Thunder Bay was a surprising fifth after the first round with a high score of 88.35 en route to a career-high World Cup placing of seventh. "It felt good to me, 88 points good, and I'm very, very happy." She scored 77 points in only her second World Cup attempt at a triple-twisting double somersault. That left her with a seventh-place score of 165.74. Last season Peterson had a pair of career-best, ninth-place finishes.

Ryan St. Onge of the U.S. produced a huge first-round score of 130.83 with a quad-twisting triple somersault, then clinched the win on the last jump of the competition. His winning score was 253.05. Joe Pack of the U.S. was second in 242.27 and Omischl, the defending overall men's World Cup aerials champion, was third for his second medal of the year. Omischl's score was 240.29. Warren Shouldice finished fourth, bumping him from second to third in the men's overall aerials standings. Leader Jeret Peterson of the U.S. had an off-day, finishing 19th. Jeff Bean of Ottawa was 15th, Ryan Snow of Calgary 18th, Cord Spero of Grande Prairie, Alta., 24th and Manuel Holden of North Bay 28th.

Jeff Pain (CP)

CANADA'S JEFF PAIN AND LINDSAY ALCOCK SLIDE INTO TOP-FIVE

St. Moritz, SUI-Canada's Lindsay Alcock powered her way down the world's only natural skeleton track to a fourth-place finish during World Cup competition in St. Moritz, Switzerland on Thursday.

The 2002 Olympian finished the race a mere +0.28 seconds behind the leader, posting a track record in her second run to finish the day with a two-run combined time of 2:24.35. "I am absolutely thrilled about my result today," said the 27-year-old, who took home the bronze medal at the World Cup in Altenberg, Germany earlier this season. "This was a day I really needed for my own piece of mind. A large part of racing is about confidence, so it was a big relief and mental boost to put down two solid runs."

It was a one two punch for the United States in the women's competition, with Tania Morel picking up her first World Cup victory, after posting a combined time of 2:24.07. Teammate Noelle Pikus-Pace, who is the current frontrunner in overall World Cup points, slid into second at 2:24.16. Switzerland's Maya Pedersen rounded out third to take the bronze medal at 2:24.21.

Jeff Pain, Calgary, who is currently leading skeleton's elite in overall World Cup standings, posted the fastest Canadian time of the day on the men's side to finish in fifth at 2:20.86. "I think I performed the best that I could in this particular race," said the 33-year-old. "I have been fighting a cold all week, so I had very low energy and it finally caught up to me."

Leading the men's competition was Chris Soule of the United States, who blasted down the St. Moritz track in a combined time of 2:19.58, while teammate Eric Bernotas took home the silver medal after posting a time of 2:19.90. Switzerland's Gregor Staeli posted the third fastest time of the day to claim the bronze medal at 2:20.00.

Six other Canadian sleds also hit the start line in St. Moritz. Michelle Kelly of Grande Prairie, Alta., was the next best Canadian on the women's draw, finishing sixth (2:24.76); Mellisa Hollingsworth of Eckville, Alta., slid into seventh (2:25.48); while Deanna Panting of Winnipeg was 13th (2:27.29). Duff Gibson, who is currently sitting in third place in overall World Cup standings, finished the day in ninth (2:21.32). Rounding out the Canadian sleds were Kelly Forbes of Calgary in 14th (2:21.86); and Paul Boehm, Calgary, at 25th (1:12.11).

The Canadian Skeleton Team, sponsored by Visa, will head to Lake Placid, United States, for the last stop on the World Cup circuit, February 7-11, 2005, before they head home to Calgary to defend their home track at the World Championships. For Complete Results: www.fibt.com

Amanda Overland (CP)

Hamelin and Overland win national titles at Canada Post Open championships.

MONTREAL-Charles Hamelin of Ste-Julie, Que., and Amanda Overland of Cambridge, Ont., were crowned the men’s and women’s national overall champions Sunday at the Canada Post Open Championships short track speed skating competition.

Both skaters also headline the Canadian team selections for the world championships in March.

The 20-year-old Hamelin won three of four races this weekend including the 3,000 on Sunday to compile 3,816 points for his first national senior overall title.
Francois-Louis Tremblay of Boucherville, Que., the 1,000 winner on Sunday, was second at 3,025 and Mathieu Turcotte of Sherbrooke, Que., third at 2,335.

‘’This is a dream weekend for me,’’ said Hamelin, 20, as he continued a breakthrough season that includes a World Cup win in December and two Canadian records in November. ‘’I just felt great on the ice and to finish it with my first career win in a 3,000 is icing on the cake.’’

On the women’s side, Overland won both the 1,000 and 3,000 metres on Sunday to surge to first place overall with 2,657 points for her first national overall crown. Kalyna Roberge of Ste-Etienne-de-Lauzon, Que., the 500 winner on Saturday, was second at 2,621 and Chantale Sévigny of Sherbrooke, Que., took third at 2,591.

‘’I raced smart and aggressive today, ‘’ said Overland. ‘’I didn’t have a good start to this competition but I regrouped and I told myself that I could do it. I put a lot of work into it this year and I wasn’t going to let it end in disappointment.’’

The Canadian line-ups for the world team championships March 5-6 in Chuncheon, South Korea and the world championships March 11-13 in Beijing were provisionally announced. The selections were based on performances at the national team trials in November (which counted for 33 percent) and this weekend’s competition.

For the men it is Hamelin, Tremblay, Turcotte, Steve Robillard of Montreal, Éric Bédard of Ste-Thecle, Que., and Jonathan Guilmette of Montreal. For the women, Overland, Alanna Kraus of Abbotsford, B.C., Roberge, Sévigny, Anouk Leblanc-Boucher of Montreal and Annik Plamondon of Montreal.

The team will also compete at the last two World Cups next month in Europe.

Mayor Tremblay (CP)

Montreal mayor continues fight for aquatic worlds.
(CBC Sports)

Montreal Mayor Gerald Tremblay returned empty-handed but optimistic Sunday following a meeting with FINA, the International Swimming Federation.

Tremblay traveled to Paris with a new financial proposal to try to convince the sport's governing body to return the 2005 world aquatic championships to Montreal. FINA unanimously stripped Montreal of the aquatic worlds on Jan. 19 after organizers failed to raise $12 million in local sponsorship money.

Since the announcement, Montreal has secured the necessary funding and Tremblay hopes to get the event back in his city. He has secured another meeting with FINA officials, but the date and place have not been decided. "I think the chances are better now than they were before," Tremblay told reporters after arriving at Montreal's Pierre Elliott Trudeau Airport on Sunday.

The championships were expected to bring about 2,000 athletes to Montreal, making it the largest sporting event in the city since the 1976 Summer Olympics.
FINA plans to name a new host by Feb. 15.

A number of cities have expressed interest in the aquatic worlds since FINA threw the event open to bids. Athens; Moscow; Cali, Colombia; and Guayaquil, Ecuador have already expressed interest. Germany and Croatia are also expected to make a pitch.

Welcome to the Canadian Olympic Committee’s Newsletter!

PODIUM is a monthly electronic newsletter aimed at keeping athletes, the sport community, our members and our partners informed about our activities and initiatives.

Our online newsletter features:

· Own the Podium - 2010: Winter Sport Community Announces Plan to be Number One in 2010
· COC Passes Marketing Rights to VANOC
· COC Restructuring in 2005 Sees Improved Athlete and Community Services Focus
· Interest Growing in Volunteering for the Vancouver 2010 Winter Games
· Athlete's Corner: Moving to the Other Side of the Microphone
· Farewell to Olympian Jack Varaleau
· Canadian Olympic Committee Calls for Applications for International Olympic Academy in Olympia, Greece
· Canadian Olympic Committee Calls for Applications for the 2005 Carol Anne Letheren Leadership and Sport Scholarship