Girard, Boutin each earn medal hat tricks at short track World Cup

Canada capped off the short track World Cup event in Almaty, Kazakhstan, with a whopping five medals on the final day of competition on Sunday.

The golden duo combined to win the 2,000-metre mixed relay along with Cedrick Blais and Alyson Charles, edging the quartets from Korea and China by tenths of a second.

Watch Canada take mixed relay gold:

Canada capture 2,000m mixed relay gold in Kazakhstan

6 years ago

Duration 3:50

The Canadian team of Kim Boutin, Alyson Charles, Samuel Girard, and Cedrik Blais left the field behind in the 2,000m mixed relay World Cup event in Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Girard, the 22-year-old from Ferland-et-Boilleau, Que., added another gold to his chest in the 500-metre race, winning with relative ease in 40.661 seconds. Hungary's Shaoang Liue (40.802) and hometown favourite Abzal Azhgaliyev (40.827) earned silver and bronze, respectively.

"It was an excellent day for me on a personal level and for Canada as a whole," said Girard, who has won gold in the 500-m distance during each of the last four World Cup seasons. "We trained very hard after Salt Lake City because we didn't get the results that we wanted. We came back stronger and it helped us achieve our best overall day to date."

Watch Girard's winning skate:

Samuel Girard tops field in 500m World Cup event

6 years ago

Duration 1:52

Canada's Samuel Girard was at the top of his game in Almaty, Kazakhstan, taking gold in the 500m short track event.

The two-time Olympic medallist Girard added silver to complete the hat trick in the men's 5,000 relay, where he teamed up with Pascal Dion, Steven Dubois and Charles Hamelin to finish in six minutes, 56.75 seconds. That result was nearly seven seconds behind the winning dutch team, but well clear of the Chinese team in third.

"Our men's team has made a lot of progress since the first World Cup in Calgary," added Girard. "We had a lot of disqualifications at the start of the season, but had only one here."

Boutin, 23, won relay bronze in the women's 3,000. Along with Danae Blais, Charles and Camille de Serres-Rainville, Canada completed the track in 4:12.193. The Netherlands and Korea won gold and silver, respectively, in the event.

Watch Boutin land on the podium again:

Kim Boutin finds podium again in Kazakhstan

6 years ago

Duration 3:28

After taking silver in the 1,000m event, Kim Boutin brought home bronze in the 1500m race from Almaty, Kazakhstan.

Boutin's final medal of the day was earned in the women's 1,500. The Sherbrooke, Que., native took bronze with a time of 2:28.476, behind Korea's Min Jeong Choi and Dutch skater Suzanne Schulting.

The Canadian also won silver in the 1,000 race on Saturday.

Watch full replay of the day's events in Kazakhstan:

ISU Short Track Speed Skating World Cup: Almaty - Sunday Dec. 9th

6 years ago

Duration 4:30:10

Watch coverage of the the ISU Short Track Speed Skating World Cup from Almaty, Kazakhstan