Short track speed skating-vk: Alex Varnyú runs in Debrecen in the men’s relay – Debrecen news, Debrecen news | News of Debrecen and Hajdú-Bihar counties
Short track speed skating vk: Alex Varnyú runs in Debrecen in the men’s relay
Debrecen – Péter Jászapáti will be replaced by Alex Varnyú in the Olympic title-defending men’s short track speed skating relay at the World Cup in Debrecen on November 18-22.
At the beginning of Thursday’s press event at the Practicing Ice Hall, Chi Ta-yu, Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China to Hungary, greeted the Chinese and host Hungarian short track team training camps here, as well as good luck with their preparations and the Beijing Beijing Olympics in February.
Team manager Ákos Bánhidi highlighted to MTI in connection with the first two rounds of the Beijing and Nagoya World Cups, he was generally satisfied with the results achieved there, even as they “sank” on the soft ice in Japan.
“We have technical, strong skaters, it’s not good for them. And in China, they bought a 1,500 piece of gold back from Ado, it still hurts,” Liu Shaoang pointed out the coach’s exclusion.
Regarding the other long-seen national team in the Far East and North America – no World Cup race has been held last season – the manager said the rivals don’t seem to have loosened either.
“As before, they are now well-armed, they have always had to be reckoned with, but it is extremely surprising they don’t really understand.
Regarding the Olympic chances of the Hungarians, he said that mainly the 500 and 1000 meters are close to the competitors, but the Liu brothers have just proved in China that with the right tactics they can earn as much as 1500.
“Besides, of course, both the man and the mix changer have a chance to get on the ice,” the manager added. In connection with the latter, he mentioned that he considers the competition to be a good initiative, because all sports try to make their productions viewer and media-centric, and the race of the mixed relay fits in perfectly with this. He remarked about the Hungarian relay, they have to “tune in a bit more with the lady couple”, and then this team can have a medal chance.
In connection with the World Cup round in Debrecen, he said, there will be a change in the Olympic championship relay: Alex Varnyú will run instead of Péter Jászapáti.
“It will give us great strength to be able to skate in front of an audience, with the help of which, if we manage to make good ice in Debrecen, I hope we can achieve similar results as in the first round of the World Cup.”
– looked forward to Bánhidi, who remarked on the women’s relay that the relay was “dancing on the razor edge”, in addition to serious performance, it would take some luck to succeed in the pentathlon, which the team manager said was “mature”. The relay is currently ninth in the ranking of countries.
Olympic champion Liu Shaoang highlighted looking back at the first two rounds of the World Cup, they were prepared that it was not certain to win medals, and that was not primarily the goal, but to get the necessary World Cup points.
“You could feel on the field that everyone was a little more tense, there was a big battle on the ice. The results could have been a little better, but you don’t have to win medals now,” Liu Shaoang said, referring to the season’s main event, the Beijing Olympics.
The 23-year-old skater said it was good for these two rounds to get to know the rivals again, to experience each other’s knowledge.
“We had to travel a lot to Asia, but now we’re going to start at home with better chances,” stressed Liu Shaoang, who won two gold and silver medals at the European Championships in Phoenix Hall last year.
“We are beyond good summer preparation, it will last until the end of the Olympics, by the time we get there, mentally and physically, everyone will be able to get the most out of themselves,” the Olympic champion looked ahead.
There will be eight men’s and women’s relays each year for next year’s Beijing Five-Ring Games. The individual numbers will be 32 on the 500 and 1000 meters and 36 on the 1500 meters, with the top three results for each competitor counting towards the qualifying points competition. It will be a novelty that the mixed relay, which has so far only won two World Cup gold medals in Hungarian competitions, will be presented at the Olympic program. It is not enough to close in the top 12 to win the right to start, it is also necessary for a given country to obtain at least two individual quotas for both sexes.
The third station will be hosted in Debrecen from 18 to 21 November, and a week later the VK series will end in Dordrecht, the Netherlands.