Walgren on fire at Special Olympics meet in Coquitlam
By The Nelson Daily Sports
Ian Walgren of Nelson improved on his season during a recent Special Olympics Speed Skating meet on the Lower Mainland.
Walgren tore up the track with blistering times posting personal best in all four of his events.
He opened in the 222 meter race with a second place finish in a time of 33:64 seconds. Walgren followed that up with a gold in the 333 meter race in a time of 47.95 seconds before skating another personal best in the 777 m race finishing first.
The time of 1:53.11 was three quarters of a lap ahead of the his closest competitor.
In the 500 m, his final race of the day Walgren took fourth in the photo finish.
Walgren finished fourth only eight tenths of a second out of first with a time of 1:10:73.
Next up for Ian are the Special Olympic Regional trials in Richmond on March 10th.
In other Skating News:
Last weekend four West Kootenay Speed skaters made the trip to Vernon for the final meet of the year.
All of the skaters skated extremely well pushing themselves to get personal best times.
Unfortunately it was not their day as Mercedes Phillips earned a PB in her 1500 m race, but in her second race of the day, she crashed in the 400 m and ended up with a slight concussion and could no longer race for the day.
Brother Tirstan Phillips also had a rough time of it falling in three of his four races still earning PB’s in two of the races.
Oliver Ludwar had two PB’s and his younger brother Charlie earned four PB’s one for each race event he was entered in.
Next up for the club is the 5 km (50 laps of a 100 m track) Skate – a – thon on Thursday, February 15, 2018 and preparation for the BC Winter Games in Kamloops.
Berend Platje and Mercedes Phillips will represent the Kootenay zone on February 24th and 25th.
