Heather Bergsma competes in the women's 1,500-meter at the Speed Skating ISU World Cup on Dec. 10, 2016 in Heerenveen, Netherlands.
Heather Bergsma just keeps churning out 1,000-meter world cup gold medals, taking her second of the weekend with a win Sunday in Berlin.
The two-time Olympian won her fifth 1,000-meter race of the five she’s entered this season, crushing the competition with her time of 1:15.08, 0.37 ahead of Marrit Leenstra of the Netherlands. Karolina Erbanova of the Czech Republic took the bronze in 1:15.50.
Earning the 80th world cup medal of her career (31 of which are gold), Bergsma now holds a commanding lead in the 1,000-meter world cup standings with 500 points, 94 ahead of Leenstra and 114 over Japan’s Miho Takagi. She also stretched out her advantage in the overall women’s standings with 935 points, 205 ahead of Leenstra.
Four-time Olympian and two-time Olympic 1,000-meter champion Shani Davis placed fifth in the men’s event with a time of 1:09.55. He was 0.47 second behind the winning time of 1:09.08 by Kai Verbij of the Netherlands and only 0.24 away from third place, which went to Nico Ihle of Germany in 1:09.31.
Team USA now sets its sights on Feb. 9-12 and the 2017 World Single Distance Speed Skating Championships, to be held at the Gangneung Oval in Korea, the venue for the PyeongChange 2018 Olympic Winter Games.
