Double gold and World Record for Jeremy Wotherspoon at speed skating World Cup.

KEARNS, Utah- Jeremy Wotherspoon of Red Deer, Alta., delivered a double gold performance on Sunday with victories in the 500 and 1,000 metre races to conclude an exceptional performance at the opening stop on the long track speed skating circuit.

With the wins, Wotherspoon now has a career leading 60 victories in men’s World Cup competition.  Cindy Klassen of Winnipeg and Christine Nesbitt of London, Ont., each added silver and bronze medals respectively.  This weekend Canada collected in total four gold, three silver and two bronze medals.

‘’I didn’t know what to expect coming into this season and things have gone really well for me,’’ said Wotherspoon, who sat out last season to ponder his speed skating future.  ‘’All the training we did in the summer has really had an effect.’’

Denny Morrison of Fort St. John, B.C., was eighth, François-Olivier Roberge of St-Nicolas, Que., 23rd and Jeff Kitura of Langley, B.C., 25th.  Steven Elm of Red Deer tied for first in the B Group race.

‘’This is in no way this is the best that I can do because I’ve hardly been back at it,’’ said Wotherspoon who ended the weekend with three gold and a bronze. ‘’So I’m excited to see what else I can do in the future.  I’m better now than I was before but definitely not perfect.’’

In the women’s 3,000, Martina Sablikova took the gold in 3:57.98, Klassen followed in 3:59.37 for her first medal this season and Renate Groenewold of the Netherlands was third in 3:59.79.  Kristina Groves of Ottawa was fifth and Clara Hughes of Winniepg seventh. Christine Nesbitt of London, Ont., was 11th and Brittany Schussler of Winnipeg 19th.

Christine Nesbitt earned her first career victory on the long track speed skating World Cup circuit on Saturday leading Canada to a 1-2 finish in the women’s 1,500-metres. ‘’Only in the past three weeks has my skating started to really pick up,’’ said Nesbitt, 22, a bronze medallist in the 1,000 at last year’s worlds. ‘’So I wasn’t going in with a lot of confidence and didn’t think I could win a gold this soon.’

Kristina Groves of Ottawa was second at 1:54.25 and Chiara Simionato of Italy third at 1:54.65. World record holder Cindy Klassen of Winnipeg was fourth in 1:54.91. Shannon Rempel and Brittany Schussler, both of Winnipeg, were ninth and 10th.

In the women’s 1,000, Chiara Simionato of Italy was the winner in 1:13.47, Anni Friesinger of Germany second in 1:13.71 and Nesbitt, paired with Simionato,  was third in 1:13.92. 

The next stop on the circuit starts this Friday at the Olympic Oval in Calgary.

Solid gold for Canada at Four Nations Cup.
By THE CANADIAN PRESS

LEKSAND, Sweden—Canada got both a challenge and the gold medal in the Four Nations women’s hockey final, the perfect way to win the tournament for a fifth time in six years.

Jennifer Botterill of Winnipeg scored midway through the first period and goalie Shannon Szabados of Edmonton stopped 22 shots to make it stand up in a 2-0 victory yesterday over the United States. “I think it means a whole lot more when the game is tight, which is really what we wanted,” Canadian coach Peter Smith said. “We wanted some games that were going to push us, make us play well and that’s what the Americans did.b “I think that makes it way more meaningful.”

Botterill scored at 10:21 of the first period and though more chances came fairly often from there, more goals did not. The Americans were a shot away from tying things up until Hayley Wickenheiser of Calgary scored into an empty net with just four seconds left.

The Cowboy Way; Alpine team has new name, but same old goal: Wins.

The Calgary Sun - Given Jan Hudec’s penchant for cowboy hats and the fact John Kucera is a Calgary kid who wears cowboy boots and drives a pickup, the new nickname made perfect sense: The Canadian Cowboys.

As part of the Canadian Alpine Ski team’s resurgence last year, the only thing missing was a nickname that separated them from the Crazy Canucks monicker that helped put our nation’s skiers on the world map. “We’d just like to have our own identity,” smiled Kucera yesterday, proudly displaying the Canadian Cowboys logo he and teammates Jan Hudec and Manny Osborne-Paradis wore on their t-shirts.

“The Crazy Canucks were an amazing group and set the benchmark for Canadian ski racing, but we’re really well rounded, hard working and a tough group of guys. Plus, we like to go out and have a good time.”

The original idea behind the nickname and gear was that anyone on the team who achieved a certain World Cup result would essentially earn rights to wear it. However, should the team continue to set new standards for medals as it did last year, the shirts may be staples at Vancouver 2010 souvenir kiosks.

And if the women’s team has anything to say about it, they’ll come in ladies sizes, too. “I’m actually going to have a t-shirt made that’s bright pink that will say ‘Canadian Cowgirls’ on it,” beamed Kitchener’s Kelly VanderBeek, 24, who opened last season at Lake Louise with a personal best third in the Super G.

“I’m going to wear it under my downhill suit at Lake Louise and if I get the result I’m hoping for, I’m going to unzip it and then show that off—you have the inside track of what’s under the suit. “It’s definitely not just the cowboys—they mean the whole team but we have to make it a little girly.” As Calgary’s Sherry Lawrence added, “we can’t let the boys have all the fun.”

Last year they sure did, as Osborne-Paradis opened the season with a second at Lake Louise, followed a day later by Kucera’s stunning Super G win—the first Canadian to do so on home soil. (Incidentally, that’s how he won his GMC truck)

Of the record 14 medals won last year—not including Hudec’s World Championship silver—most were from the men’s side. This year the goal is 14 World Cup podiums, with a bigger push from the women. “We’re anticipating the girls team will look over and say ‘hey’ and step up,” said Alpine Canada president and former Crazy Canuck, Ken Read, thrilled the biggest team ever is earning a name for itself.

While Thomas Grandi retired and Gen Simard and Allison Forsyth are injured, the team has the depth to match last year’s medal haul and the hope is they can also duplicate the quick start they had last year. In two weeks, the Bombardier Lake Louise Winterstart kicks off with the men’s speed events, followed a week later by the women. The women’s World Cup returns to Panorama for the first time since 1992 Nov. 24 and 25 for two technical events.

Getting ready; Beijing 2008.

The Winnipeg Sun - Become an Olympian and see the world. Become a real good one, and get a free trip here to play tourist before you come back for the Games. Climb the Great Wall of China. Shop at the Silk Market. Breathe the, er, air. See the sights.

It’s about bringing Canada’s elite athletes to China to experience the culture shock, to get used to the quirks of this country which is joining a new world at a million miles per hour. It’s about seeing and dealing with the possibilities of the unbelievable pollution here, the heat and humidity. And the food.

When the Canadian Olympic Committee paid for our women’s soccer team to come here to play China in July, team manager Les Meszaros took pictures of every display card set up for dinner one night:

• The Fragrance Explodes The Cowboy Bone.
• Discuss The Chicken Ball Sea Rong Fish Willow Tree.
• Red Kidney Bean Paste Lantern Festival Day.
• Radish Silk Tea Hibernation Of Insects.
• Pickled Mustard Tuber Shredded Meat Soup.
• Flutters The Flagerant Tended Chicken.

“We were walking down a street one day and they were selling scorpion-on-a stick. They were selling snake-on-a-stick. And worms. It was so disgusting,” star Canadian striker Christine Sinclair said. It’s about knowing, when you come back, to bring your peanut butter if that’s the way it’s going to have to work for you.

At the same time the women were back in September for soccer, Canada’s Olympic gold medal triathlon competitor Simon Whitfield was having his indoctrination experience at a pre-Olympic World Cup event.

“This program initiated by the COC is brilliant,” he said. “I love the thinking behind it as it says to the athletes ‘get the tourist stuff done before the Games because once they start you should come to compete for medals.’ I appreciate and respect this concept.

Chef de mission Sylvie Bernier said the plan makes this year a very different Olympic year for Canada’s athletes. “We’re trying to have most of them come over to China because China is not Europe. It’s a totally different world. We want them to experience the culture, the food, the language, the pollution, the heat. We want them to see it and feel it and live it before the Games.”

Chris Rudge, the CEO of the COC said it’s something that evolved out of the research to determine why Canada wasn’t converting world championship performance into Olympic performance. “Give them every edge. Give them a comfort level. They’re young. The first thing they want to do when they get here is go to the silk market and haggle. We want to get that all done so they come back and can’t wait to get to the village and get focused.”

And when they walk into the Bird’s Nest stadium for the opening ceremony, Rudge wants them to be the second most popular country in the parade of nations. “We’re going to be walking in with Guy Dashan,” he said. “He’s an entertainer who acts more Chinese than the Chinese. He goes by Guy Dashan performing here and Mark Rowswell living back in Canada. He’s bridged the gap between East and West in making light of the stereotype that Chinese have of Westerners. He is the best known Canadian in China. It’ll be bigger than walking in with Wayne Gretzky.”

Rudge said Dashan is known to one billion Chinese which makes him one of the most famous people on the planet. Yet Rudge admitted he didn’t know about him. “When a cab driver asked me where I was from, I said ‘Canada.’ He said ‘Guy Dashan!’ I got to the hotel and Googled him. I tracked down his agent who gave me his e-mail address. Turned out he lives three blocks from me in Thornhill,” he said.

“We met at the local Starbucks and worked out a way for him to be associated with our team. When he walks in on the front row with our team, the entire crowd will go crazy.”

If Mark Rowswell, a.k.a. Guy Dashan, can figure out China, maybe our athletes can, too.

WRESTLING CANADA LUTTE Canada Secures Women’s Olympic Qualifying Tournament.

OTTAWA - Wrestling Canada Lutte has been awarded the first Olympic Qualifying Tournament for women trying to qualify for the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.

The event will be held in Sherwood Park, Alberta, which was the site of the 2004 Canadian Olympic Wrestling Trials. The competition will take place at Strathcona County’s Millennium Place complex which is one of the top multi-sport facilities in the country. The competition will be held May 16 & 17, 2008 and should attract women wrestlers from over fifty countries looking to gain access to the 2008 Olympic Games.

Clive Llewellyn, President of Wrestling Canada Lutte, noted the great interest and support of the Edmonton based Friends of the World Cup Wrestling Society which allowed the national association to make its bid to FILA, the international body responsible for Olympic style wrestling. The Society has formed an Organizing Committee for the event with long time Edmonton wrestling personality Bill Dowbiggin serving as Chair.

“Olympic qualification and Olympic performance are the main thrust of our high performance program for the next ten months. Hosting an Olympic qualification event for women both shows the support of the Canadian Wrestling community to our Women’s program and allows the continued exposure to high level women’s wrestling to take place in our country spurring on the many young women who are involved in this sport”; said Llewellyn.

Canada’s National Women’s Coach, Leigh Vierling, commented; “the depth of the field in women’s international wrestling has increased dramatically since the 2004 Olympic Games and hosting this event is one of the most important elements in our plan to maintain a top three position in Beijing for our Women’s Team”.

Six-time World Champion, Christine Nordhagen was pleased to hear that Canada would be hosting this important event. “Canada has played a leadership role in women’s wrestling and being awarded the Olympic Qualifying Tournament is a sign of the respect our program has gained internationally”; said Nordhagen who is now an Assistant Coach at the University of Calgary and an Apprentice Coach in the National Team program.