Canadian women take silver in short-track relay

Last Updated: Thursday, February 25, 2010 | 11:52 AM ET

By Chris Iorfida, CBC Sports

Canada won its second short-track speedskating medal of the Vancouver Games on Wednesday, with the women's 3,000-metre relay team moving up a spot to take silver after a disqualification at Pacific Coliseum.

The Canadian team comprises Tania Vicent of Laval, Que., Montreal's Kalyna Roberge, Marianne St-Gelais of Saint-Félicien, Que., and Calgary's Jessica Gregg.

The women earned Canada's 13th medal of the Olympics. The country has landed on the podium in the relay in every Games since its inception in 1992.

Canada appeared to have settled for bronze in a time of four minutes 9.137 seconds, but South Korea, which came across the line first, was disqualified.

Officials later said South Korea was disqualified after Kim Ming-Jung clicked skates with China just after an exchange with five laps to go.

"We knew that the Koreans and the Chinese would be battling really hard in front of us, so obviously we wanted to be right with them, and watch what was going on and try not to get into that trouble, and that's exactly what we did," said Gregg. "We were right behind them and right on them, but we were able to skate a clean race, so it was really good."

China captured gold for the first time ever in the event, in 4:06.610, with the United States ending up with the bronze medal.

South Korea had won the last four Olympic relays dating back to 1994. Canada won the inaugural run in 1992.

Vicent, 34, has now won two silvers and two bronzes in the relay, as a part of every Olympic team since 1998.

"We were with the Chinese and Koreans the entire time," said Vicent about Wednesday's race. "We didn't make any tactical errors, they did. They lost their gold medal, that helped us get our silver medal. It's just a bonus, because honestly we were so happy with our bronze medal."

Roberge, 23, won silver in this event with the Canadian team in Torino four years ago.

For St-Gelais, it is her second medal of the Vancouver Games. She celebrated her 20th birthday last week with a silver in the women's 500 metres.

The 21-year-old Gregg is the daughter of Dr. Randy Gregg, defenceman on five Stanley Cup teams with the Edmonton Oilers, and Kathy Gregg (nee Vogt), who was a long-track speedskater at the 1976 and 1980 Olympics for Canada.

China's team of Sun, Wang Meng, Zhang Hui and Zhou Yang jumped for joy when they were announced as Olympic champions after the officials reviewed the race.

Meng is the two-time Olympic champ in the 500 and now has five career Games medals in total. Yang got her second medal in Vancouver after winning the 1,500.

Women's 1,000 metres

Earlier in the evening, Roberge set a short-lived Olympic record to win her opening heat in the 1,000 metres in one minute 31.033 seconds, with Gregg of Calgary taking her heat in 1:32.565.

Vicent qualified second behind Park Seung-Hi of South Korea after getting bumped out of contention in the race. Allison Baver of the United States and Jorien ter Mors of the Netherlands were both disqualified in the heat.

Katherine Reutter of the United States would later lower the Olympic mark to 1:30.508.

Men's 500 metres

Charles Hamelin of Sainte-Julie, Que., won his men's 500-metre heat in an Olympic record of 41.463 seconds.

Hamelin, the boyfriend of St-Gelais, is looking to reach the podium after being shut out of the medals in both the 1,000 and 1,500.

Montreal's Francois-Louis Tremblay then bettered Hamelin's mark in a time of 41.397 to move on, while Olivier Jean of Lachenaie, Que., qualified after a second place showing.

Jean was overtaken in the final lap by seven-time Olympic medallist Apolo Ohno of the United States.

Three-time Olympic medallist Lee Ho-Suk of South Korea also moved on to the quarter-finals.

The men's 500 and women's 1,000 will continue with quarter-finals, semis and finals will take place on Friday night.