SHORT TRACK: Second-day sweeps claim world titles for Lim and Schulting

World Short Track Champion Suzanne Schulting (NED) wins the Superfinal. (Photo: ISU)

The ISU World Championships in Short Track were decided by second-day performances from Korea’s Hyo-Jun Lim and Dutch star Suzanne Schulting that gave them the title of “World Champion” for 2019.

Lim, the Olympic 1,500 gold medalist last year, won his specialty on the first day, ahead of Canada’s Samuel Girard, but then took over on Sunday in Sofia (BUL). He first won the 1,000 m, just ahead of favored Dae-Heon Hwang (KOR) and then squeezed out a win on the 3,000 m over Russia’s Semen Elistratov.

That gave Lim three wins in the four events – Hwang won the 500 m over Olympic champ Dajing Wu (CHN) – and an easy overall win with 102 points to just 55 for Hwang. The 1-2 finish for Korea was their first since 2013.

“I came to the World Championships for the first time last year and finished fourth, so I am really happy to win this time,” said Lim. And it is great that my teammate got second place. On the ice we always try to win, to beat each other, but off it we are friends.”

In the women’s racing, defending champ Min-Jeong Choi won the 1,500 m on Saturday, but Schulting came on strong on Sunday, winning the 1,000 m – where she was Olympic Champion – and then the 3,000 m Superfinal, edging Choi by 1/10th of a second.

That was enough for an 81-76 win in the overall classification, the first-ever World Championship overall title for a Dutch skater woman.

“I am incredibly happy right now,” said Schulting. “It’s bizarre, incredible. I won this because I trained so, so hard last summer. This really counts. After my Olympic title at PyeongChang over 1,000 m, I wanted to prove that I am not a one-day fly. I won so many races this year. I won the European title, so that encouraged me to come to Sofia and finish with the World title. All credit to my coach, Jeroen Otter.

Summaries:

ISU Short Track World Championships
Sofia (BUL) ~ 9-10 March 2019
(Full results here)

Men

500 m: 1. Dae-Heon Hwang (KOR), 42.490; 2. Dajing Wu (CHN), 42.275; 3. Ziwei Ren (CHN), 42.888. Disqualified: Shaolin Sandor Liu (HUN).

1,000 m: 1. Hyo-Jun Lim (KOR), 1:26.468; 2. Dae-Heon Hwang (KOR), 1:26.657; 3. Semen Elistratov (RUS), 1:26.660; 4. Keita Watanabe (JPN), 1:26.877; 5. Tommaso Dotti (ITA), 1:26.967; 6. Ziwei Ren (CHN), 1:27.369.

1,500 m: 1. Lim (KOR), 2:31.632; 2. Sam Girard (CAN), 2:31.685; 3. June-Seo Lee (KOR), 2:31.717; 4. Steven Dubois (CAN), 2:31.814; 5. Elistratov (RUS), 2:32.438; 6. Hongzhi Xu (CHN), 2:35.284. Disqualified: Hwang (KOR) and Watanabe (JPN).

3,000 m Superfinal: 1. Lim (KOR), 5:00.998; 2. Elistratov (RUS), 5:01.120; 3. Watanabe (JPN), 5:01.847; 4. J-S Lee (KOR), 5:01.917; 5. Ren (CHN), 5:05.156; 6. Dubois (CAN), 5:05.189; 7. Girard (CAN), 5:07.162; 8. D. Wu (CHN), 6:08.291.

Final Standings: 1. Hyo-Jun Lim (KOR), 102; 2. Dae Heon Hwang (KOR), 55; 3. Semen Elistratov (RUS), 44; 4. Samuel Girard (CAN), 29; 5. Dajing Wu (CHN), 22; 6. Keita Watanabe (JPN), 21; 7. June-Seo Lee (KOR), 21; 8. Ziwei Ren (CHN), 19.

5,000 m Relay: 1. Korea (Hwang, Le, Lim, Park), 7:04.292; 2. China (Ren, Wu, Xu, Yang), 7:04.651; 3. Hungary (Burjan, Krueger, S-S Liu, Varnyu), 7:04.961; 4. Russia, 7:18.095.

Women

500 m: 1. Lara van Reijnen (NED), 43.267; 2. Kexin Fan (CHN), 43.427; 3. Suzanne Schulting (NED), 43.518. Disqualified: Martina Valcepina (ITA).

1,000 m: 1. Schulting (NED), 1:28.986; 2. Min-Jeong Choi (KOR), 1:29.187; 3. Kim Boutin (CAN), 1:29.211; 4. Ji-Yoo Kim (KOR), 1:30.679; 5. Safia Prosvirnova (RUS), 1:30.803.

1,500 m: 1. Choi (KOR), 2:29.741; 2. Boutin (CAN), 2:29.803; 3. Prosvirnova (RUS), 2:29.843; 4. J-Y Kim (KOR), 2:29.961; 5. Hanne Desmet (BEL), 2:30.148; 6. Veronique Pierron (FRA), 2:30.884. Disqualified: Ekaterina Efremenkova (RUS).

3,000 m Superfinal: 1. Schulting (NED), 5:26.880; 2. Choi (KOR), 5:26.980; 3. J-Y Kim (KOR), 5:27.039; 4. Prosvirnova (RUS), 5:27.121; 5. Yize Zang (CHN), 5:27.198; 6. Boutin (CAN), 5:27.428; 7. Kexin Fan (CHN), 5:29.195.

Final Standings: 1. Suzanne Schulting (NED), 81; Min Jeong Choi (KOR), 76; 3. Kim Boutin (CAN), 37; 4. Lara van Reijnen (NED), 34; 5. Ji-Yoo Kim (KOR), 29; 6. Sofia Prosvirnova (RUS), 26; 7. Kexin fan (CHN), 24; 8. Yize Zang (CHN), 13.

3,000 m Relay: 1. Korea (Choi, G-H Kim, J-Y Kim, S-H Shim), 4:13.904; 2. Russia (Efremenkova, Konstantinova, Malagich, Prosvirnova), 4:14.353; 3. Canada (Boutin, Serres-Rainville, Charles, Sarault), 4:14.984; 4. Netherlands, 4:21.751.