DORDRECHT, NED (February 10, 2012) – It was a strong day for Team USA in Dordrecht, Netherlands for the opening qualifying rounds at the Korean Air ISU Short Track World Cup #6.

The Ladies & Men's Relay teams both advanced to tomorrow’s semifinals. The Men’s squad (Kyle Carr (Peachtree City, GA), Jordan Malone (Denton, TX), Travis Jayner (Midland, MI) and J.R. Celski (Federal Way, WA) posted a 7:11.676 to win their heat over Canada (7:12.409) and Italy (7:14.437) respectively. Team USA men will face Korea, China and Canada in tomorrow’s semifinal.

Team USA’s ladies (Lana Gehring (Glenview, IL), Alyson Dudek (Hales Corners, WI), Emily Scott (Springfield, MO), and Tamara Frederick (Park Ridge, IL) skated a 4:20.721 to a close finish behind Korea (4:20.372) and Netherlands (4:20.432), and qualified for tomorrow’s semifinals with Canada, China and Russia.

“I think the team is skating great and we are making our final preparations for great results at Worlds,” said Scott following today’s relay.

Malone, Celski, Scott, Frederick and Gehring all advanced in their 1000m(1) heats and move on to tomorrow’s quarterfinal.

Dudek, Cho and John-Henry Krueger (Pittsburgh, PA) all advanced from their  500m rounds and will skate in Sunday’s quarterfinals.

Carr, Celski, Krueger, Gehring, Frederick and Scott all advanced in today’s 1500m heats and will skate in tomorrow’s semifinals.

“This is the last World Cup of the season, and also a very important World Cup to prepare for World Championships. This week the athletes have more confidence, which should be good preparation for Worlds,” added U.S. Short Track Head Coach Jae-Su Chun.

Full race results are available at http://www.sportresult.com/federations/ISU/ShortTrack/. Racing resumes tomorrow from 9:30am-1:30pm (MST). Watch World Cup racing live from Dordrecht at http://livemanager.eurovision.edgesuite.net/isu/site/index.html.