麻豆社区

Five local speedskaters hit the ice in Medicine Hat, Alta. last weekend for their annual fall meet.

Each of the Whitehorse Rapid Speed Skating Club members skated away with either personal bests or first-place finishes.

The youngest of the Yukon skaters, Lucas Taggart-Cox of Marsh Lake achieved personal bests (PBs) in the 300- and 400-metre races where he placed second in both finals. He also placed third in the 1,000-m final and won the 200-m final with a blistering time of 28.440 seconds to finish second overall in the Division 3 Mixed Gender.

His older brother Caius Taggart-Cox finished third overall in the Div. 3 Mixed Gender, and he did this by placing second in the 1,000-m final, setting a PB of 54.36 seconds in his 400-m heat, finishing third in the 400-m final and fourth in the 200- and 300-m finals.

In Div. 1 Mixed Gender, Michael Ritchie of Haines Junction managed PBs in his 200-m heat and 400-m final where he placed third, and shaved almost nine seconds off of his 1,500-m time. He also skated to a second-place finish in the 200-m final to finish seventh overall out of the 14 skaters in his division.

Micah Taggart-Cox, the oldest of the three Marsh Lake brothers, had a very good meet, chalking up PBs in all the distances he skated.

His PBs ranged from 1.21 seconds off his previous-best time for the 200-m sprint and a whopping 56.40 seconds off his time in the thigh-burning 3,000-m race. In the finals, Micah placed fourth in the 400, third in the 200-, 1500- and 3000-m races, resulting in a fourth-place finish overall in the Div. 1 Mixed Gender.

The oldest Yukon skater at the meet, Shea Hoffman, missed a number of PBs by a matter of seconds, but he did very well placing fourth in the 3,000-m final, first in the 500-m final and first in the 1000-m final.

However, because of the way points were awarded in this division, Hoffman's final placing was 17th out of 21 skaters.

Hoffman's next major meet will be the 2013 Western Canadian Short Track Speed Skating Single Distance Championship, Nov. 16 and 17 at the Olympic Oval in Richmond, B.C.

"For our first meet of the season, I am very pleased with how our skaters did,鈥� head coach Phil Hoffman said in a press release. "This was a very competitive meet, and it is very good preparation on our way to the Arctic Winter Games in Fairbanks in March.

"Thanks go to the Yukon Government's Sport and Recreation Branch, Sport Yukon, and Lotteries Yukon for helping us develop our Yukon athletes at these Outside meets.鈥�

The next events for all speedskaters will be time trials Nov. 17 and the Arctic Winter Games trials for eligible skaters Dec. 8. Both will be held on the ATCO ice surface at the Canada Games Centre in Whitehorse.