CALGARY – British women were beaming while the Canadian women’s team had mixed emotions following their World Cup skeleton race Thursday in Calgary.
Elizabeth Yarnold won and British teammate Shelley Rudman earned the women’s overall World Cup title in the season finale.
Rudman was third on the Canada Olympic Park track, which gave her enough points to vault past Marion Thees of Germany and take the crystal globe that goes to the season’s victor.
Martins Dukurs of Latvia continued to dominate men’s skeleton, winning both the Calgary race and the overall title.
Amy Gough of Abbotsford, B.C., finished tied for third in the women’s race with Rudman. It was Gough’s second World Cup medal of the season. Anja Huber of Germany was second, just over half a second behind Yarnold.
“Stepping stones to Sochi,” declared Gough, referring to the 2014 Winter Olympics in Russia.
“I feel really great because I struggle a lot on the start. I know that I’m a little bit behind in the start but it feels really good to know I can be competitive being a little bit behind.”
Amy Gough should not be confused with, nor is she any relation to, Canadian luger Alex Gough.
Mellisa Hollingsworth of Eckville, Alta., tied for fifth Thursday. She was disappointed to drop from third to fourth in the overall standings.
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Gough earned her first career World Cup victory in December in Winterberg, Germany. The 34-year-old didn’t start having international success until later in her career.
Hollingsworth’s face fell when she saw on a television screen at the finish line that she’d fallen out of the top three in the overall standings.
“That’s really disappointing because I’ve had a solid season this year.” Hollingsworth said. “Everywhere I was going, I was definitely a podium threat.”
Rudman couldn’t get through post-race photos without wiping her eyes. The 30-year-old from Pewsey was a runner-up to the World Cup champion the previous three years. Rudman dedicated her win to parents Jack and Josie.
“I did it for my mom and dad because they had a really hard year,” a tearful Rudman said. “My dad suffered a brain hemorrhage at this time last year and he nearly lost his life. He’s made a really good recovery.
“He really wanted to me to win the overall when he was in hospital at this time last year, so I kind of promised him I’d keep going and try and win it. So it’s really special.”
The British women’s team is currently deep. Rudman won an Olympic silver medal in 2006 and Amy Williams took gold in 2010.
But Williams didn’t make the top six in the first four races of this season. She was replaced by 23-year-old Yarnold, who earned her second World Cup victory in as many months.
“We know what we’re doing now and the fact we don’t have a track, we have to learn really fast when we move to other tracks,” Rudman said. “Our uptake of knowledge has to be really fast and I think that helps us in some ways and hinders us in others, but at the moment we’re having a really good year individually.
“Both Lizzy and I put in a lot of hard work throughout the summer.”
The Canadian women’s team is similarly competitive. Sarah Reid of Calgary finished seventh in Thursday’s race. Gough ended up sixth and Reid 10th in the overall standings.
Dukurs won seven of eight men’s races this season. A blistering second run down the Calgary put him track put him 0.68 seconds faster than runner-up Alex Tretiakov of Russia.
“The first run Alex did really great and it was really close. I fixed my mistakes at key points,” Dukurs said. “The overall season is really great, unbelievable. Keep going, one more competition.”
Germany’s Frank Rommel was third in the race and finished second to Dukurs in the overall. Eric Nielson of Kelowna, B.C., was the top Canadian male in sixth. Olympic men’s champion Jon Montgomery of Russell, Man., is taking this season off.
Competition continues with men’s and women’s bobsleigh Friday and the men’s four-man bobsleigh Saturday.
The sliders head to Lake Placid, N.Y., for the season-ending world championships next week. Medallists will be determined by combined times over four runs instead of two at World Cups.
Hollingsworth won bronze at last year’s world championship in Koenigssee, Germany.
“As soon as you mentioned Lake Placid, I got excited about it,” Hollingsworth said. “As much as I was disappointed with today, that’s the goal. That was the goal from the beginning of the season and we start work immediately tomorrow.”
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