Antoine Gélinas-Beaulieu knew from the outset that he would have a lot to do to get on the podium in the 1000m raced on Sunday, at the long track speed skating World Cup in Tomaszow Mazowiecki, Poland. The Quebecer finally came within a few hundredths of a second of achieving the feat, to his great surprise.
Gélinas-Beaulieu finished fourth in the event with a time of 1 min 9.91 s, just behind Pole and crowd favorite Damian Zurek, 6 hundredths faster than the Canadian skater. The duo of Hein Otterspeer (1 min 9.24 s) and Kjeld Nuis (1 min 9.52 s) shone during this race to sign the Dutch double.
“I have to admit that it’s a bit unexpected for me. I was expecting slightly less satisfying results! Gélinas-Beaulieu started out in an interview with Sportcom.
It must be said that the hours of training on skates have been limited in recent weeks, but the 30-year-old athlete did not show anything during the weekend. After fourth and seventh places in the team pursuit and the 1,500m on Friday, the Sherbrooke native continued his momentum 48 hours later.
“It’s really, really encouraging to see that I’m here with so little skating in my legs. We just came back from a bike camp and my goal was above all to regain my feelings and get information for the last races of the season. In the end, I did a lot better than that and that’s a really good sign for the future,” continued the man who had won the bronze medal in the 1000m in Calgary before the Christmas break.
I always knew I could skate with the world’s elite. To be there, with the best in the world, shows me that I still have a lot of potential!
Antoine Gelinas-Beaulieu
The Olympian of the Beijing Games is therefore thinking big for his last two competitions of the campaign, a second World Cup in Poland next week, followed by the Worlds in Heerenveen, in the Netherlands, in March. According to the principal concerned, slight adjustments could propel him even further on the ice.
“There are plenty of small technical points that are not yet perfect, especially in my positioning, in my thrust and in my race management. We still have a lot of time and it’s good to see that I’m still on the same level, even if everything is not 100% at the moment, ”he analyzed.
Game postponed for Dubreuil and Maltais
Also in action in the 1000m, Laurent Dubreuil for his part finished 10e with a time of 1 min 10.29 s. As usual, the Lévisien had a good start, but rather than keeping his foot on the accelerator, he preferred to conserve his energies for the last lap, which did not prove fruitful.
“It’s really not my type of ice, so I decided to change my strategy and it was a complete failure. I was too relaxed in the first round and I was never able to put the energy back on, ”he explained in videoconference.
Despite this poor performance, Dubreuil still ranks second in the overall standings for this event with 200 points, while Gélinas-Beaulieu (177 points) is fourth. If he admits that it will be difficult, if not impossible, to catch up with leader Hein Otterspeer (235 points) during the last race of the campaign, the Olympic vice-champion assures that he will leave everything on the ice at the next opportunity.
“I’m going to keep myself embarrassed and I won’t do this again for a couple of years. Next week, it will be in the background Léon! “, he launched, laughing.
The only Quebecer competing on Sunday, Valérie Maltais was in the mass start final. Well positioned for the last lap of the race, the Saguenéenne was hampered by a maneuver by the Italian Laura Peveri just before the finish line. So she had to settle for the 11e place.
” She [l’Italienne] made an extension several meters from the line and it harmed three people. It was quite dangerous, but she was not penalized and I finished just outside the points. I still feel that there is not much missing and I am not far away. I have the speed, but I lack a bit of strategy, ”said the one who saw her teammate Ivanie Blondin finish second behind the Dutch Marikje Gronewoud.
“We took the time to discuss strategy before the race and we had a good game plan. The goal is to find what we can do together to have a good performance while countering the strategies of other nations, which we did well today,” concluded Maltais.
Activities will resume on Friday at the Lodowa Arena ice rink in Tomaszow Mazowiecki.