Team Canada celebrates after winning a silver in the team mixed relay short track speed skating.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
For a millisecond, short track speed skater Kim Boutin wasn’t sure how to feel when she watched her teammate William Dandjinou cross the finish line in second place.
The Canadian team had entered the mixed team relay race with their hearts set on a gold-medal finish. Was this a failure? But then the 31-year-old looked over at her beaming teammate Courtney Sarault and the reality kicked in: They had just won an Olympic medal in their first Olympic event.
“As soon as I saw her smile I was like, ‘Yay! … We’re happy,’” she said. “This team is so strong, so connected and that’s the thing I’m most proud of.”
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Tuesday’s silver marked a strong start for the close-knit Montreal-based squad, which arrived in Milan with a goal to win more medals than any Canadian team in Olympic history – surpassing the previous record of six, set in 2002.
Led by powerhouses Dandjinou and Sarault – both Crystal Globe winners, the highest individual honour in short track speed skating – Canada’s 10-member team is deep, with every member capable of a podium finish. Canadian short track skaters brought home 31 medals – including 15 golds – in the World Tour this season, as well as the ISU Team Crystal Globe for the second time.
Canada started the mixed relay in an unideal position with Sarault sitting third on the line. The battle plan in the 18-lap sprint was to try to jump ahead of either the Italian or Chinese skaters, but she didn’t see an opening and didn’t want to risk a fall. For much of the race, Canada was trapped in third position and then, at one point, fell to fourth behind Belgium.
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But in the final laps, Boutin gave Félix Roussel a push and he saw an opening, wedging himself forward past two skaters.
“I just saw the Chinese – the ice was really bad, and I saw him drifting a bit, so I didn’t want to get caught in that and I kind of jumped over him,” Roussel said afterward.
William Dandjinou, centre, crosses in second place for the silver medal in the team mixed relay short track speed skating in Milan, Italy, on Tuesday.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
The race ended with the Italians in first place with a time of 2:39.019, Canada crossed the line at 2:39.258 and the skaters from Belgium earned bronze with a time of 2:39.353. The Chinese, the defending Olympic champions, fell to fourth.
The other two members of Canada’s mixed team roster are Steven Dubois and Florence Brunelle. Of the six skaters, different combinations compete in the different rounds.
Short track speed skating is not just a race. It’s a sport that requires athletes to make high-stakes, split-second decisions, where one wrong move can result in a game-ending wipe out. Sarault said she was proud of how the team managed the race, staying composed and making smart decisions.
“Of course we want to win,” she said. “But I think we were fourth [at the] last exchange to go. And the fact that we went from fourth to second in the mixed relay is kind of crazy.”
Head coach Marc Gagnon said that even when Canada fell back, he had total confidence that his crew would find a way to get back on the podium. With the chippy ice conditions in the Milano Ice Skating Arena, Gagnon said his skaters have so far been finding ways to stay steady on their feet.
“I know my team was adapting well,” Gagnon said. “I was really confident that they would find a place to pass and in the very end, I was really confident, if we were still fourth with Will on the ice, that he would find a way.”
Back in 2002, Gagnon was part of the Canadian short track team that brought home a record six medals. Gagnon won three of them.
Asked how he was feeling about Canada’s goal of a record medal haul, Dandjinou said they were all feeling very confident: “Well, we have one event and one medal, so you tell me. Are we on track?”
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