Canadian Blondin skates to bronze-medal finish in 3,000 metres at World Cup

HARBIN, China — Canadian speed skater Ivanie Blondin kicked off the season’s first World Cup stage with a bronze medal in the women’s 3,000 metres on Friday.

The Ottawa native crossed the finish line in four minutes 9.78 seconds for her first career medal in that distance.

Czech skater Martina Sablikova (4:08.26) and Marije Joling (4:09.40) of the Netherlands won gold and silver respectively. Isabelle Weidemann, also from Ottawa, took the ninth spot.

Blondin was ninth in last season’s overall World Cup standings in the 3,000.

“I definitively wasn’t expecting that,” Blondin said. “When my coach and Ted-Jan (Bloemen) came over to announce that I’d won bronze, I said, ‘What? There’s no way this happened.’

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“Still, I was a little bit more confident than usual going into this race, knowing that the ice is a little bit slower and that I’m more of a gritty skater, so it kind of played to my advantage. I was telling myself that a top-5 result would be good.”

Marsha Hudey of White City, Sask., finished fourth in the 500 with a time of 38.29 seconds for her best-ever result in that distance.

Japanese skaters Nao Kodaira (38.00) and Marki Tsuji (38.17) finished first and second, followed by China’s Jing Yu (38.18). Winnipeg’s Heather McLean finished eighth. 

Calgary’s Bloemen was eighth in the men’s 5,000 (6:29.81) while Toronto’s Jordan Belchos (6:36.67) was 15th.

The Canadian Press