Above video: Canada’s ice dancing duo Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir skated to perfection, but so did the American team. World records broken, more than one! In the end, it was silver for Canada’s sweethearts.
What you need to know about Sochi today:
There are a couple of medal hopefuls in action for Canada Tuesday, two of them competing in the same event.
Medal hopefuls to watch:
The men’s ski halfpipe takes place on Tuesday. Justin Dorey and Mike Riddle are two Canadians who could end up on the podium.
- Men’s Ski Halfpipe Qualification – 8:45 a.m. ET / 5:45 a.m. PT.
- Men’s Ski Halfpipe Final – 12:30 p.m. ET / 9:30 a.m. PT.
- While Dorey and Riddle are Canada’s best shots at a medal in this event, there are two other Canadians competing – Matt Margetts and Noah Bowman.
The medals aren’t handed out in women’s bobsleigh on Tuesday, as only the first two runs take place, but Canada has the gold-medal favourites in the event, Kaillie Humphries and Heather Moyse.
- Women’s Bobsleigh Run 1 – 10:15 a.m. ET / 7:15 a.m. PT.
- Women’s Bobsleigh Run 2 – 11:20 a.m. ET / 8:20 a.m. PT.
- Humphries and Moyse will have a target on their backs as reigning Olympic champions. There is one other Canadian sled in the field, featuring Jenny Ciochetti and Chelsea Valois.
The men’s snowboard starts with the heats, then goes to quarterfinals, semi-finals then the final. All rounds are set to take place on Tuesday.
- Men’s Snowboard Cross first round – 1:30 a.m. ET / 10:30 p.m. Monday PT.
- Men’s Snowboard Cross Quarterfinals – 1:55 a.m. ET / 10:55 p.m. Monday PT.
- Men’s Snowboard Cross Semi-Finals – 2:10 a.m. ET / 11:10 p.m. Monday PT.
- Men’s Snowboard Cross Final – 2:20 a.m. ET / 11:20 p.m. Monday PT.
- Canadians to watch: Kevin Hill, Jake Holden, Chris Robanske, Rob Fagan.
Up-and-coming Canadian ski star Marie-Michèle Gagnon takes to the slopes in her best event, the giant slalom, on Tuesday.
- Women’s Giant Slalom Run 1 – 12:30 a.m. ET / 9:30 p.m. Monday PT.
- Women’s Giant Slalom Run 2 – 4 a.m. ET / 1 a.m. PT.
- Other Canadians in the field are Marie-Pier Prefontaine and Erin Mielzynski.
Canada’s women’s 3000-metre short track relay team takes on China, Italy and South Korea in the final on Tuesday.
- Women’s 3000-metre final – 5:55 a.m. ET / 2:55 a.m. PT.
- Canada’s team is made up of Marianne St. Gelais, Marie-Éve Drolet, Valérie Maltais and Jessica Hewitt.
Three Canadians will try to reach the podium in a sport that Canadians are notoriously unsuccessful at – biathlon.
- Men’s 15 km mass start biathlon – 5:30 a.m. ET / 2:30 a.m. PT.
- Canadians to watch: Nathan Smith, Jean-Philippe Le Guellec and Brendan Green.
Other Events
There are only two non-medal events taking place on Tuesday, both in short track speed skating.
One will see three quarters of the women’s 3000-metre relay team competing in the women’s 1000-metre event.
- Women’s 1000-metre heats – 4:30 a.m. ET / 1:30 a.m. PT.
- Valérie Maltais, Marie-Éve Drolet and Marianne St. Gelais will be the three Canadians in the field.
Charles Hamelin will be in action for the first time since his disappointing result in the 1000-metre event.
- Men’s 500-metre heats – 5:15 a.m. ET / 2:15 a.m. PT.
- Hamelin will be joined by teammates Charle Cournoyer and Olivier Jean in the event.
What happened on Monday
Canada captured one medal, a silver, on Monday.
The day was had its fair share of highlights and disappointments for Canadian athletes.
Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir were the country’s only medallists, grabbing the silver in ice dancing with an emotional performance that could be their last, as they have said they are thinking about retiring after the Sochi Olympics.
This was an expected result, with Virtue and Moir thought to be one of two pairs with a shot at gold. The American pair of Meryl Davis and Charlie White were the only team to defeat the Canadians. Both pairs skated a near-flawless program as Virtue and Moir set a world record score with their performance, which was later broken by Davis and White.
Other Canadian Highlights
The women’s hockey team defeated Switzerland 3-1 and moved on to the gold-medal game, where they will meet the Americans on Thursday. Canada was expected to make easy work of the Swiss team. It looked like they were going to do just that with three goals in the first 10 minutes of the game.
But Swiss goaltender Florence Schelling shut the door after that point and the Canadians only won by a margin of two. The final score was 3-1. Natalie Spooner had Canada’s first two goals, both assisted by Canadian flag-bearer Hayley Wickenheiser. Mélodie Daoust added the third. Jessica Lutz of Switzerland scored the only goal that beat Shannon Szabados, who was great in net.
In curling, the Canadian women’s team led by Jennifer Jones closed out the round robin with a 9-4 victory over South Korea.
The Canadians came into the tournament as likely podium finishers, but not necessarily gold-medal favourites. After a perfect 9-0 round robin record, that has changed. Sweden is the only other team in the field to have won more than five of their nine games. Canada takes on Great Britain (5-4) in the semi-finals on Wednesday.
The final two runs of the men’s two-man bobsleigh competition took place on Monday, with three Canadian sleds in the field.
The Canada 3 sled of Justin Kripps and Bryan Barnett was the only one with a chance at the podium, sitting 4th heading into the final run. Their sled skidded through a turn at one point and bumped a wall, costing them valuable time and resulting in a 6th-place finish overall. The Canada 2 team of Chris Spring and Jesse Lumsden finished a spot behind, in 7th, while the highest-ranked Canadian sled of Lyndon Rush and Lascelles Brown finished 9th.
Travis Gerrits, the only Canadian in the men’s skiing aerials competition, had a strong showing but not quite as strong as he had hoped. Gerrits came into Sochi having experienced some recent success on the World Cup circuit and was thought to be a potential podium contender. Gerrits made the final round, but finished well off the podium in the end – he was 7th.
Disappointments
The men’s ski jumping team was not expected to medal, as the Canadians are very young and inexperienced, while other teams like Germany and Austria feature multiple world-class athletes. The Canadians were, however, hoping to finish better than last in the 12-team field. A couple of slips and one complete wipeout courtesy of Matthew Rowley bumped the Canadians down to 12th and they did not qualify for the final round.
Biathlete Megan Imrie was the only Canadian competing in the women’s 12.5 km mass start. She only found out that she would be racing an hour and a half before the start. She finished a disappointing 28th out of 30. Her result would have been much better if she had not missed three of her five shots at the last shooting range, adding almost two minutes to her time.
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