Canadian Jeremy Wotherspoon clinched the season crown in the 500 metres with another gold medal-winning performance at a long-track speedskating World Cup event Friday in the Netherlands.

Also on Friday, Denny Morrison of Fort St. John, B.C., won a silver medal in the 1,500.

Wotherspoon, from Red Deer, Alta., clocked in at 34.82 seconds. Joji Kato of Japan was second at 34.84 and Kyou-Hyuk Lee of South Korea third at 34.99.

"My race had a lot of strong points," said Wotherspoon, at 66 the career leader for World Cup victories in men's competition. "It's a great way to start the weekend."

Mike Ireland of Winnipeg was seventh, Vincent Labrie of St-Romuald, Que., was 12th and Denny Morrison was 17th.

"Overall, it was definitely a good season for me in the 500," said Wotherspoon, who will pocket $14,000 U.S. as the World Cup champion.

"I didn't know exactly how things would go after taking last season off. It feels good to come back and have things go this well. The key for me this season was very specific training, which helped me to accelerate quickly and be comfortable at top speed."

In the men's 1,500, Shani Davis of the U.S. won the gold and the World Cup distance title, clocking in at 1:45.25. Morrison was second in 1:45.51 and Enrico Fabris of Italy was third in 1:45.53. Morrison was in a tough pair with crowd favourite and all-around world champion Sven Kramer of the Netherlands. Kramer was fourth in 1:45.87.

Arne Dankers of Calgary was 11th and François-Olivier Roberge of St-Nicolas, Que., 21st.

In the women's 500, Jenny Wolf of Germany already had the World Cup season title locked up but still won for the 11th time in 13 races. Shannon Rempel of Winnipeg was 15th, Kerry Simpson of Melville, Sask., was 16th and Tamara Oudenaarden of Edmonton was 18th.

In the women's 3,000, Martina Sablikova of the Czech Republic won in 4:03.75 and is the World Cup champion at the distance. Kristina Groves of Ottawa was seventh.

Canadian Olympic champion Cindy Klassen did not race. She returned to Winnipeg earlier this month after her sister, Lisa, was in a serious car accident. Klassen said last week that she expects to miss the rest of the speedskating season while she helps her sister recover.

Competition continues through to Sunday.

Courtesy Canadian Sport News