HIGH ACHIEVERS: Isabelle Weidemann’s third Winter Olympics could feature historic medals, mentorship

ISABELLE WEIDEMANN
Sport: Speed Skating
Event: Women’s 3,000 metres, 5,000 m, Team Pursuit
Age: 30
Hometown: Gloucester
Residence: Calgary
Local Club: Gloucester Concordes
Third Olympics
Instagram: @i_weidemann

VIEW ISABELLE’S COMPETITION SCHEDULE HERE.

By Martin Cleary

Long-track speed skater Isabelle Weidemann stands at the doorway to Canadian Olympic greatness.

That door is currently locked. But the Gloucester Concordes Speed Skating Club member can open it, if she develops the right code during an 11-day period next month.

If she can repeat her three-medal performance from the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics by winning her fourth, fifth and sixth medals at next month’s Games in Milano Cortina, Italy, the door will automatically open for her. At that moment, she can cross the door’s threshold and become the third Canadian to win six career medals at a Winter Olympic Games.

Weidemann put herself in that exclusive position four years ago at the Beijing Games by winning her first three medals, which just happened to be a rare, full set of one gold, one silver and one bronze.

And her impressive return to high-performance skating this season has given her a glorious opportunity to become an unprecedented, repeat three-medal performer at the Olympics, which would rocket her into a share of top spot as Canada’s most decorated Winter Olympian.

The top of the list already belongs to two of Canada’s greatest Winter Olympians, who were both speed skaters, one in short track and the other in long track. Although short-tracker Charles Hamelin of Sainte-Julie, PQ, and long-tracker Cindy Klassen of Winnipeg have six medals apiece, you can argue the former may be 1A and the latter 1B based on gold-medal production. If you were to list them alphabetically, it would play out the same way. But Klassen also had a spectacular five-medal effort 20 years ago.

Hamelin won four gold, one silver and one bronze medals in his incredible five-Olympic career dating from 2006 Turin through 2022 Beijing. He also is tied with Summer Games’ track and field sprinter Andre De Grasse of Toronto as Canada’s most decorated male Olympian at six medals apiece.

Klassen made her big splash in her second Olympics at the 2006 Turin Winter Games. After winning a bronze at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games, she struck for a medal in every one of her five races, earning one gold, two silver and two bronze.

Manoeuvring her six-foot, two-inch frame with precise and consistent pacing over The Ice Ribbon (National Speed Skating Oval) in Beijing, Weidemann was one of only two Canadian athletes to win a full slate of medals in 2022. Short-track speed skater Steven Dubois followed Weidemann’s example and also celebrated a gold-, silver- and bronze-medal Olympics in his Winter Games debut.

Weidemann opened her second Olympics in Beijing with a bronze medal in the 3,000 metres. She followed with a silver-medal performance in the 5,000 metres five days later and, after another five-day break, joined Ivanie Blondin of Gloucester and Valérie Maltais of La Baie, PQ, to win the women’s team pursuit gold medal.

Read More: ‘Totally insane’ Olympics brings Isabelle Weidemann 3 medals, COC reward money

The odds of Weidemann earning three medals in back-to-back Winter Games is strikingly strong given her impressive World Cup season heading into her Olympics.

Weidemann will have plenty of time to prepare and recuperate for her three races. She will likely pass on the Opening Ceremony on Feb. 6 as she is scheduled to race the next day.

On Feb. 7, she will compete in the women’s 3,000 metres, which has been a slow, but encouraging building process for her this World Cup season.

At the opening World Cup in Salt Lake City, she placed fifth in three minutes, 57.84 seconds, but was only six-tenths of a second out of third place. The next World Cup in Calgary saw Weidemann climb one position to fourth in 3:56.66, which left her a mere two-tenths of a second from third place.

Joy Beune of The Netherlands won both races on the two fastest long-track ovals on the World Cup circuit.

During the fourth World Cup stop in Hamar, Norway, Weidemann’s time of 4:01.30 squeezed her into second place between winner Marijke Groenewoud of The Netherlands at 4:00.95 and third-place finisher Ragne Wiklund of Norway at 4:01.41.

The final World Cup women’s 3,000-metre race of the season will be staged Saturday in Inzell, Germany.

Five days after her Olympic 3,000-metre race, Weidemann will face her marathon race, the 5,000 metres. It’s a bit of an unknown as there was only one 5,000-metre race on this year’s World Cup circuit.

But Weidemann finished second in the 5,000 metres on the Heerenveen, The Netherlands, track in 6:50.11. Wiklund placed first in 6:49.01, while Beune was third in 6:51.83.

The 5,000-metre ranking shows a different picture as it includes results from national single-distance races and Olympic trials. The Netherlands has the top four ranked skaters with Merel Conijn at No. 1 in 6:41.48 on her home track and Marijke Groenewoud No. 2 at 6:44.59 at home.

Wiklund and Weidemann are ranked No. 5 and No. 6 respectively, but they posted better times than the Dutch skaters at the World Cup race in Hamar in mid-December.

Weidemann’s results have to be encouraging as her combined three 3,000-metre and one 5,000-metre races have her in second place in the World Cup standings in the long-distance class. She didn’t finish in the top five in the past two seasons, after placing second in 2022-23 and first in the 2021-22 campaign heading into the Beijing Olympics.

Wiklund has been the No. 1 long-distance skater on the World Cup circuit for the past three seasons.

The Olympic women’s team pursuit will be staged over two days with the quarterfinals on Feb. 14 and the semifinals and medal races set to go Feb. 17.

Canada will be one of the favourites as Weidemann, Blondin and Maltais continue to perfect a new team pursuit strategy and hope to repeat as Winter Games gold medallists.

Read More: Gloucester’s Ivanie Blondin & Isabelle Weidemann strike silver with new team pursuit plan

On the World Cup circuit this season, Canada emerged as the overall champion. Canada won the third and final team pursuit of the season to clinch the title, after placing second in the opening two races.

Canada finished with 168 points to outscore runner-up Japan, which won the opening race, at 156 points and the United States at 145 points. The Netherlands was first in the second race, but struggled in the other two and was fourth at 134 points.

Team pursuit was a long-time stronghold for Canada, but other countries recently have caught up. Canada didn’t have a World Cup podium finish in three 2024-25 races or finish in the top five in the overall standings.

This brought about a major change to the Canadian team’s race strategy this season and it has been fruitful.

Weidemann, Blondin and Maltais decided to return to a no-exchange strategy, where one skater would lead for the entire six laps and the other two would draft behind her. The seven-year-old team will have Weidemann as its engine with Maltais and Blondin directly behind maintaining a high, consistent pace.

The three team members also devoted significant time last summer to training together to sharpen their pacing and teamwork.

“We played around with our strategy a lot this summer,” Weidemann said in a Speed Skating Canada news release, after the opening World Cup in Salt Lake City, Utah, last November.

“We skated together a lot more, which is something we haven’t done in the last four years since the Games. We kind of all went different directions, with different coaches, but we made it a priority to work on the team pursuit this summer.”

Canada was a world leader for a number of years before discovering it was being caught and passed by other nations, especially in the 2024-25 season.

“We used exchanges quite a bit in the past, but the world has gotten so much faster so we had to go back to a no-exchange strategy and figure out who should be in front,” she added. “We looked at everyone’s strengths and have created a strategy that reflects that.

“Today was the first time we used it in a race, so I think we need to trust it a little bit more. It’s fast and now we know it’s fast.”

Weidemann, Maltais and Blondin struck silver in the Salt Lake City World Cup team pursuit with a time of two minutes, 52.50 seconds, which narrowly missed their four-year-old Canadian record of 2:52.067. Japan won in 2:52.13, while the United States was third in 2:54.01.

Besides her own personal goals for her third Winter Games, Weidemann wants to come alongside the new Canadian speed skating Olympians and serve as a mentor.

“I am super excited for these Games and of the team that we are taking,” the Colonel By Secondary School grad said in a recent Speed Skating Canada news release announcing the country’s 15-skater Olympic team. “We’ve got a lot of new faces with a lot of young energy and I’m really proud to be a part of this group.

“I’ve changed a lot as an athlete and as a person these past four years. I went to the last Games with the mindset to perform and that was the only thing I was looking to do. I still have those goals and absolutely want to perform and represent Canada the best I can in Milan, but I’m approaching these Games with a veteran’s mindset.

“I want to take on more of a mentorship role and make sure the next generation of athletes coming up feels supported.”

ISABELLE WEIDEMANN COMPETITION SCHEDULE

Isabelle Weidemann (Speed Skating)

Isabelle Weidemann (Speed Skating)

Isabelle Weidemann & Ivanie Blondin (Speed Skating)

Isabelle Weidemann & Ivanie Blondin (Speed Skating)

Add Isabelle’s schedule to your calendar on this page.

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