TORONTO – Charles Hamelin won’t be defending his Olympic gold medal in Sochi after crashing in his qualification heat in men’s 500-metre short-track speed skating event Tuesday.
Hamelin won gold in the 500-metre event at the 2010 Vancouver Games.
Hamelin was leading on the last lap of his 500-metre heat when he crashed into the pads. It appeared he caught a blade in a turn and went down.
Hamelin told CBC that he has no idea what happened. “I realized that I was down when I was on the mats,” he said.
“It’s not like I did one mistake,” he said. “I just had bad luck.”
The crash cleared the way for Sjinkie Knegt of the Netherlands to win the heat. Knegt won his country’s first short track when he took bronze in the 1,000 last weekend.
The Quebec native was eliminated from the Olympic men’s 1,000-metre short track event on Saturday after falling in the quarter-finals.
Hamelin was also part of the Canadian men’s relay team that crashed in the semi-finals of the men’s 5000-metre short track event, and failed to qualify for the finals last Thursday.
Hamelin earned gold in the 1,500-metres in Sochi and was favoured to win three more medals.
– with files from The Associated Press
Comments