ISU

After having been home to the ISU European Allround Speed Skating Championships fifteen times in history, Heerenveen (NED) will host the ISU European Speed Skating Championships in single distances format for the first time this weekend. A total of fourteen titles will be up for grabs in three days of exciting competition in the Dutch Speed Skating Mekka.

Junior medals are no guarantee for future success in Speed Skating, but some of the previous Youth Olympic Champions went on to win major titles in the senior category as well. Min-Seok Kim (KOR) is the only Speed Skater to this date to have won both Youth Olympic and senior Olympic silverware since the inaugural Winter Youth Olympic Games in 2012.

The ISU Junior Grand Prix of Figure Skating series 2019/20 with its eight events including the ISU Junior Grand Prix of Figure Skating was full of exciting moments. The best of the best – the top six in each discipline - advanced to the Final in Torino in December. Historic moments and amazing performances highlighted the series. Let’s have a look back.

The Youth Olympic Games (YOG) showcase the stars of tomorrow and quite a few successful Figure Skaters from the first two editions of the event in 2012 and 2016 rose to prominence.

Short Track skaters often describe the complex love-hate relationship they have with their sport. The sometimes desperately cruel twists of fortune

Short Track Speed Skating fans should keep an eye on the 2020 Winter Youth Olympic Games in Lausanne, Switzerland this January because the event is a great showcase for future stars of the ISU World Cup Short Track Speed Skating circuit, ISU World Short Track Speed Skating Championships and Olympic Winter Games.

As the festive season approaches and another year draws to an end, it is an opportunity to reflect on 2019 and look to the future and what 2020 will bring.

Nathan Chen made headlines last year when he announced that he would become a full-time student at Yale University. Not many Singles, Ice Dance or Pairs skaters of Chen’s calibre have gone on to pursue both academics and athletics. However, for many Junior and Senior Synchronized Skaters, this balancing act is all too familiar.

The Biellmann spin is one of the best known spins in figure skating – and the only one named after a person. It is an upright spin, a variation of the layback spin. While spinning on one leg, the skater pulls the other leg up and holds the foot extended over and behind the head. By ISU rules, the spin is a Biellmann, when "the level of the boot passes the head so that the boot is above and behind or over the head”. There are various degrees of extension of the free leg.

The fourth ISU World Cup Speed Skating event took place this weekend in Nagano (JPN). If you missed it, catch up with these highlights.

Olympic and World Champion Alina Zagitova (RUS) will take a break from competing and will not participate in the ISU European and World Figure Skating Championships this season, but has not retired.

This week, In Focus brings you the best pictures of the ISU World Cup Speed Skating event that took place this weekend in Nagano (JPN). 

Pavel Kulizhnikov and Danila Semerikov raced to gold in the 1000m and 5000m on Sunday to maintain their country’s stranglehold on the fourth leg of the ISU World Cup in Nagano. Russia’s men dominated the three days of competition, winning five out of seven events. With silver behind Semerikov, New Zealand's Peter Michael grabbed his first individual World Cup medal in two years.

Local hero Nao Kodaira (JPN) may have had to settle for bronze, losing out to Russia’s Angelina Golikova in the 500m, but the excited crowd in Nagano’s M-Wave still had a gold medal to cheer for as Japan, back in their 2018 Olympic Games-winning line-up, triumphed in the Team Pursuit.

The world’s leading female speed skaters are still trying to work out just how to slow the progress of Ivanie Blondin (CAN) and Brittany Bowe (USA). The pair swept all before them once again on Saturday: Blondin adding a track record and 3000m gold to her ever-growing collection, while Bowe showed no mercy in the 1000m, taking her third gold in three races so far this season and adding her own track record for good measure.