Mark Arendz had set the bar incredibly high by reaching the podium in each of his six races at the Paralympic Games in Pyeongchang in 2018. This was a Canadian record for the number of medals won at the Paralympic Winter Games.
As a result, a fourth-place finish in the 20-kilometre cross-country standing race on Monday didn’t sit well with the 32-year-old from Prince Edward Island.
Arendz bounced back in style with victory in the 10-kilometre standing biathlon event at the Paralympic Games in Beijing on Tuesday, posting one of the best performances of her career.
“It fueled, I think, that determination to do better today,” Arendz said. I set the bar pretty high. [Mais] after good races, bad races, it seems to me that there is always another race to come. So I got used to this idea of dealing with both the ups and downs of different races and then being able to move on to the next one and say to myself, what do I need for this race? What is my goal for this race? »
Arendz clocked 31 minutes 45.2 seconds and was the only athlete in the peloton to be perfect (20 out of 20) at the shooting range.
The Canadian was involved in a duel with the Ukrainian Grygorii Vovchynskyi, setting the stage for a thrilling end to the race. Vovchynskyi held a 14-second lead over Arendz before the two showed up at the final firing range. Arendz hit all the targets, while the Ukrainian athlete missed one, meaning he had to take a penalty lap.
Vovchynskyi (32:18.0) won silver on Tuesday and Kazakh Alexandr Gerlits took bronze (33:06.5).
The “Heartbeat of Canada”
On his last stint on the range, Arendz could hear Team Canada Chef de Mission Josh Dueck beating the ceremonial drum, a gift to the Maskwacis Cree Nation team.
Arendz called the drum “the heartbeat of Canada”.
“It was pretty special to feed off of that and accelerate to the finish line and take the win in front of the cheering Canadians,” he said.
His gold medal was his second medal in Beijing, after the bronze in the 6K biathlon, but also the 10th medal of his career.
It was Canada’s only podium finish on Tuesday, bringing the team’s medal tally to 13. China leads with 27, while the Ukrainian team, which arrived in Beijing after a grueling trip of four days by bus in the middle of the Russian invasion, is second, with 17.
Arendz is among the busiest athletes at the Games, with three more races on the schedule.
“Every day it’s just about making sure after the race that every move is dedicated to being smart and efficient with all the different tools I have at my disposal, whether it’s physiotherapy sessions, jogs light, things like that to help me recover for the next morning,” he said.
On leave until Friday, he couldn’t wait to sleep.
Arendz was seven years old when he lost his left arm in a grain auger — a long metal tube with a spiral blade that moves grain like an elevator — on the family farm. He reached out to help pass the grain and lost his balance. The device pulled him up to his shoulder.
Sport has been his therapy, says Arendz. Learning tasks like buttoning his shirt prepared him for the day-to-day life of a world-class athlete.
Para hockey semi-finals
Vovchynskyi had won the first Ukrainian gold medal of the Games in the 6K biathlon. Arendz said he knows his rival well, whose family is still in Ukraine.
“I was very happy for him when he won. I try to support him as best I can, but also the rest of the team. »
Hot on the heels of her bronze medal Monday, Saskatchewan’s Brittany Hudak finished sixth in the 10k standing race.
The Canadian para hockey team secured a berth in the semifinals on Thursday with a 6-0 win over South Korea.
James Dunn had a hat trick and added an assist, while Tyler McGregor, Billy Bridges and Liam Hickey completed.
“I’m so happy with Dunn’s performance, and we also got a lot of great input from a lot of other key players,” coach Ken Babey said.
He praised the South Korean goaltender as the Canadians edged their opponents 42-4 in the penalty shootout column.