Speedskating: A tale of two countries

The first pre-Olympic world cup speedskating races of the new millennium began this weekend in Berlin.

Unlike 1997, the pre-Nagano Olympics season, there are no new technological advancements to report on, such as the klapskate, which shredded the world record book every weekend, sometimes every day.

Unlike every season since the late 1980's, Gunda Niemann-Stirnemann, winner of eight Olympic medals, eight all-around world championships and nearly 20 World Cup season points titles, will miss the entire 2001-02 campaign, including Salt Lake City, due to pregnancy (more later).

Another who did not skate this weekend captured the spotlight -- for the wrong reasons.

Defending European men's all-around champion Dimitri Shepel of Russia was not allowed to skate this weekend due to a high level of hemoglobin in his blood as revealed in a pre-race blood test Friday. A reading of 15 to 16 is normal -- Shepel's was 20. He was given provisional clearance to start Sunday's men's 5000 meter opener, but Shepel was conspicuously absent from that as well with no explanation forthcoming from race organizers or the International Skating Union. The ISU is trying to crack down on doping, and there will be more heard from this before it's all over with.

The last time speedskating fans saw Jennifer Rodriguez was the first weekend of March, front and center of a spectacular implosion at the World Single Distance Championships in Kearns, Utah, the 2002 Olympic speedskating venue.

It was the final pair of the women's 1500m championship, and Rodriguez was paired with Germany's Anni Friesinger, the world all-around champion and invincible on that distance last season. The Miami native was on her way to the first world title of her career and hand the German a calling card for next season; until 130 meters from the finish, Rodriguez hit the figurative wall, spent and exhausted. Friesinger motored past her to win the title, and the American ran out of gas -- and out of the medals entirely, finishing fifth. How would she respond on the first weekend of the season?

We began to find out; and it's promising.

Sunday, in what should be a season-long slobberknocker of a rivalry on the women's metric mile, Friesinger still had Rodriguez's number, winning the opening 1500m race of the Essent ISU World Cup season with a 1:57.86 time, but was just 24/100ths of a second ahead of the American. A surprise occurred in the bronze medal spot, where German Sabine Volker, who normally competes in sprint races of 500 and 1000 meters, won the first 1500m medal of her career, just .2 behind Rodriguez. Another German, Claudia Pechstein, and Maki Tabata of Japan rounded out the top five. Friesinger is a threat to win four gold medals at next year's Salt Lake City Olympics.

It was a similar one-nation dominance on the men's 5000, with the Netherlands sweeping the top three medals and four of the top six positions. Gianni Romme, world record holder on this and the 10,000 meters, cruised to a near 4-second win (6:28.92) over teammates Bob deJong (6:32.68) and Rintje Ritsma (6:33.08). Vadim Sayutin of Russia was fourth, and a shocking surprise, little-known Norwegian Stian Bjorge was fifth.

The news was not as encouraging for the hosts of the 19th Olympic Winter Games. On Sunday, KC Boutiette was disqualified in the 5000, which may be the first time in his career he was DQ'd in a world cup race. Derek Parra was a little over nine seconds behind Romme in ninth place. Chris Witty was 11th in the women's 1500, with Catherine Raney 29th, Sarah Elliott 32nd and Shana Sundstrom 44th out of 49 skaters.

On Saturday, Parra, who captured silver in the World Single Distance championships last March on the 1500, was not even the top American in the field of 61 skaters, finishing 10th. Boutiette edged him out for 9th place. Other American finishers were Tim Hoffman (13th), J.P. Shilling (29th) and Chris Callis (41st). No other American women competed on the 3000.

With Niemann-Stirnemann on the shelf, the women's 3000m at the kickoff race of the season would be noteworthy for who would be the one to end German dominance on the medal stand, as in all three spots? The answer turned out to be from the country of the last Winter Olympics (Japan).

Maki Tabata, two-time defending Japanese all-around champion, got her turn on the podium for the first time in a 3000 meter race since January 30, 2000, capturing the bronze medal (4:12.17) finishing behind Pechstein (silver, 4:09.69) and Friesinger (gold, 4:08.44). An impressive showing by Rodriguez (4:12.58) and Canada's Cindy Klassen (4:13.55) rounded out the top five.

Saturday's other marquee race was the men's 1500, with a Norwegian skater who didn't have the best of seasons in 1999-2000 having a renewed sense of purpose and vowing on the record to be the best men's metric miler in the world in the weeks leading up to the opening weekend.

Petter Andersen, 10th in the world cup standings on the distance last season, began to take a small step in fulfilling that promise by capturing the gold medal in a dead heat with Jakko Jan Leeuwangh of the Netherlands in a time of 1:50.23, kind of slow, considering the world record is five seconds faster. Leeuwangh's teammate, Erben Wennemars bagged the bronze in 1:50.26 as the top six finishers were within just a quarter second of each other. World Cup champion Aleksandr Kibalko of Russia was 4th and defending world all-around champion Ritsma, in what many believe in February will be his last chance at a gold medal on a distance race, came in fifth.

The Deutsche Eisschnelllauf Gemeinschaft (DESG, the German Skating Federation) announced Niemann-Stirnemann's pregnancy on October 17 in Berlin. Niemann will instead contribute color commentary for German TV at the 19th Winter Olympics, which would have been her fifth and final Games. It appears the 35 year old Niemann-Stirnemann will close out her storied career in 2003, when the world all-around championships are scheduled for Berlin.

The impact is enormous on several levels. It gives skaters from other countries a chance to crack the German eins-zwei-drei (1-2-3) stranglehold on the 1500, 3000 and 5000 meters for women. It will give an opportunity for the past two women's world all-around champions, Pechstein (2000) and Friesinger (2001) to emerge from their countrywoman's formidable shadow. And from their own ranks, perhaps up and comers Claudia Irrgang or Daniela Anschutz can rise to the occasion. Or as we saw this weekend, will Volker's bronze encourage her to dabble a bit more on the 1500 as well as handling sprint duties?

Nevertheless, there will be a changing of the guard in women's distance speedskating, a year earlier than expected.

Rodriguez's WSD collapse was a galling defeat, since neither Niemann-Stirnemann nor Pechstein, citing exhaustion, competed in that 1500. It raised serious, legitimate questions about her medal chances next February at the same venue in the same race. After all, if she couldn't beat Friesinger, nor even make it on the podium with Gunda and Claudia on the sidelines, then how in the world could she do better with everybody there?

On October 26 at Kearns, we began to find out.

In the World Cup Qualification event at the Utah Olympic Oval the weekend of October 26th, J-Rod was in mid-season form, setting a new American record on the 500 and coming within a half-second of Chris Witty's national record on the 1000. The next day, she came within less than a second of Friesinger's current world record on the 1500. She will skate a full plate of races in the next month beginning with this past weekend's opener in Berlin, where there is genuine promise that good ultimately came out of the ashes of that fateful March afternoon.

Now with Gunda out of this season's races, does anyone else have a chance of overtaking her world cup career medal count of 98 golds, 23 silvers and eight bronze -- 129 total?

No, no and no.

The next two closest to Niemann-Stirnemann are long since retired -- Bonnie Blair's 121 career medals (67-29-25) and Dan Jansen's 89 (37-40-12), respectively are second and third. German Monique Garbrecht is the leading active speedskater -- way behind the top three with 77 career medals. While she will inch closer to Jansen, Ritsma will surpass former East German Uwe-Jens Mey for 5th place, as he is only six medals behind Mey's 67. There will be a free-for-all for seventh place, as four skaters with impeccable credentials are just 5 medals apart; Jeremy Wotherspoon, current 1000m world record holder (57), Norway's Adne Sondral, Olympic and World Single Distance defending men's 1500m champion (54), Canada's Catriona Lemay Doan, the defending Olympic champion at 500 meters (also 54) and Japan's durable Manabu Horii (52). His teammate, super-sprinter and defending Olympic and WSD champion on the 500m Hiroyasu Shimizu is just one medal ahead of all-arounders Pechstein and Austria's Emese Hunyady (47 vs. 46). Witty is 15th on the all-time medal list with 40.

After Berlin, here are the remaining Essent ISU World Cup events:

Next weekend -- Innsbruck, Austria (men's and women's 1500, men's 5000, women's 3000).

11/24-25: The Hague, Netherlands (same as Innsbruck except for men's 10,000 and women's 5000 which will replace the men's 5000 and women's 3000).

12/1-2: Kearns, Utah (sprint opener -- men's and women's 500 and 1000m each day).

12/8-9: Calgary, Canada (same as Kearns, but men's and women's 1500 included).

Then there will be a break for countries to hold their Olympic selection competitions, and the final world cup before the Games will be in Heerenveen, Netherlands on January 11-13 (a three-day affair, with two 500m races for men and women, and one race each on the men's and women's 1000 and 1500, men's 5000 and women's 3000). Two events in March (at Oslo and Inzell, Germany), conclude the world cup season.

So strap yourselves in, winter sports fans - unlike Skate America, where figure skating was exposed one more time as a sport less legitimate in its outcomes than pro wrestling, speedskating is now underway. It's going to be one great ride.