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Post by mtnme on Jun 3, 2009 9:22:57 GMT -8
Athlete Biography: Kalyna RobergeHometown: St-Étienne de Lauzon Date of Birth: 10/01/1986 Current Residence: Montréal Coaches: Martin Gagné, Sébastien Cros, Club: Chaudière-Ouest Training Centre: National Short Track Training Centre (Montréal) Years on National Team: 4 years Occupation: Student Highlights Bronze medallist in the 500m, 1000m, and relay during the 2008 World Short Track Championships where she finished 4th overall Named Female Athlete of the Year at the 2008 Canadian Sport Awards Won 4 individual medals during the 2007-08 World Cup season including 1 gold, 2 silver, and 1 bronze Ranked first overall in Canada in 2007-2008 World Champion in the 500m and 3rd overall at the 2007 World Short Track Championships Named 2007 and 2008 Female Skater of the Year – Short Track by Speed Skating Canada Won first Olympic medal at 2006 Games (silver in relay), and also finished 4th in the 500m Silver medallist in the relay, bronze medallist in the 500m and 1000m and 4th in 3000m at the 2006 World Championships, where she finished 3rd overall Named Speed Skating Canada’s 2005 Rising Star (short track) World Champion in the 500m and silver medallist in the 1000m at the 2005 World Junior Championships Bronze medallist at 2005, 2006, 2007 and 2008 World Short Track Team Championships Quick Facts Started speed skating at the age of 7 Got interested in speed skating after watching her brothers skate Leisure activities are horseback riding and the country Favourite saying: Success comes to those who dream of being successful To read more stats on Kalyna, go to her link on Speedskating Canada: www.speedskating.ca/team-page2.cfm?memberID=11093&teamID=147&memType=Athlete
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Post by mtnme on Aug 17, 2009 10:59:36 GMT -8
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Post by sunshine on Oct 18, 2009 13:18:19 GMT -8
Fully Focused: Kalyna Roberge The Globe and MailBy Beverley Smith and Sean Gordon, The Globe and Mail Posted Friday, October 16, 2009 10:22 PM ET
The international short-track speed-skating circuit has its share of glamour and exoticism, but that doesn't make it any easier to enjoy if you intensely dislike flying.
Thankfully for Canadian women's team ace Kalyna Roberge - for whom it's an ordeal to travel to races in far-flung places such as China - the upcoming 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics are a comparatively short five-hour jaunt from home.
The 23-year-old student from St-Étienne-de-Lauzon, Que., a hamlet in the farmland south of Quebec City, won a silver medal at the 2006 Turin Olympics as a 19-year-old, and is determined to better the feat in British Columbia in February.
Not that she's allowing herself to look too far ahead.
"The Games are still a long way away, there's a lot of work to do before then," the soft-spoken Roberge said after a training session at Montreal's Maurice Richard Arena earlier this autumn.
Roberge stands a pixyish 5 foot 2 and is a retiring type away from the arena. In a sport of edgy iconoclasts, she's partial to the quiet life and country music. But outward appearances belie her fierceness as a competitor.
She is a deceptively powerful skater, known for her explosive passing - which she displayed at a World Cup event in South Korea last September, winning a bronze medal in the 500-metre final despite being hampered by an injury flare-up.
As veteran Canadian skater Tania Vicent said of her teammate after the 2006 Olympic relay final - where Roberge was the youngest woman on the squad but nevertheless twice powered it to second place from third over the 27-lap, 3,000-metre race - Roberge's opposition actually seemed to fear her.
Though Roberge clearly remains one of the dominant sprint skaters in women's short track, the fear may have dissipated a little.
Her Olympic preparations have been a fraught business as she tries to recover from a series of hip and back injuries that limited her to a handful of races last season.
At a 500-metre race in China in September - she will likely race both the 500 and 1,000 in Vancouver - Roberge felt a twinge but was able to recover in time for South Korea the following week.
"I still feel some effects and sometimes there's pain, but it's manageable. I've been skating with weighted tights to try and help it along and keep me in position," she said just a few days before the flare-up.
The good news is Roberge and the rest of the Canadian team will have until Nov. 5 to rest their aches - that's when the World Cup circuit lands in Montreal for the first of two final tune-ups (the last is in Marquette, Mich., a week later).
"It will be an opportunity to do some scouting of the competition. I spend a fair bit of time analyzing and visualizing what it is the others are doing," she said.
The hometown race, in particular, will also be a good barometer of Roberge's fitness - she and the team are on a training schedule with the goal of seeing them peak in February.
The upcoming events are of weightier importance than the two Asian races - where the final seeding for the Olympics will be decided - and Canada is aiming to qualify for the maximum three spots allowed at each distance.
Until then, it's a safe bet Roberge will spend her spare moments in St-Étienne-de-Lauzon, where her family and boyfriend live - the pair are clearing land for a horse farm they hope to open after the 2010 Olympics.
Roberge freely admits she doesn't like being far from home. It was one thing to fly to a Canadian championship in Prince George or to an event in Wisconsin when she began her career. But it was another thing to fly to her first international World Cup in Beijing - the 2004 world junior championships.
It's just in her nature to want to be in control, which may explain her strong antipathy toward flying. Roberge is the youngest of four children - the rest of them boys - who started out figure skating because speed-skating programs did not exist in their community of 15,000.
But as soon as one did start, the Roberge brothers signed up, and their little sister soon followed, dropping a sport she thought far too feminine for her bold, aggressive bent.
Although Roberge confesses she was far from comfortable on that flight to Beijing, she quickly asserted herself on the ice.
"It didn't matter who it was," she said in a recent interview. "It was just a bunch of girls. I was going to pass them on the inside, pass them on the outside.
"I didn't necessarily think the race through," she continued. "Now that I've matured, and have a few more years under my belt, I've had a chance to think about race strategy."
Roberge's greatest challenge at the 2010 Games will defeating China's Wang Meng, an Olympic champion at both Salt Lake in 2002 and Turin. However, Canadian women's short-track coach Sébastien Cros believes Wang is a long way from invincible.
"I think it's difficult to beat this girl all through the year," he said. "But one time, at the right time, I think it's possible. And I think Kalyna has the potential to beat this girl."
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Post by mtnme on Nov 18, 2009 17:37:01 GMT -8
Check out Kalyna's website. Kind of a fun opening. The rest is in French for those of you who speak it. Any interpreters? www.kalynaroberge.ca/
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Post by Laura (Lori) on Feb 1, 2010 0:56:14 GMT -8
Roberge one of few black speed skaters The Canadian Press / Jennifer Ditchburn / January 25, 2010 MONTREAL - When Kalyna Roberge blazes around the rink, she's also blazing a trail.
The 23-year-old short track speed skater is ranked fifth in the world this season and is also one of the only black athletes competing on the international circuit.Read the entire article at: www.ctvolympics.ca/news-centre/newsid=27946.html
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Post by Laura (Lori) on Mar 20, 2010 10:04:35 GMT -8
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Post by Laura (Lori) on May 6, 2010 21:39:14 GMT -8
"Canada's Kalyna Roberge taking a break next year" From speedskateworld.com/?p=6700 - you'll find a link to the original (in French) article... Tags: Kalyna Roberge / Short Track Speedskating
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Post by Laura (Lori) on Sept 5, 2010 12:40:09 GMT -8
Many thanks to Donald Lewin Nelson for bringing this to our attention on Rocker-U's Facebook page, and to Tony Chung for posting the SSC link: Kalyna Roberge Takes a Break from Speed SkatingDate posted: 08/24/2010 Double Olympic medalist in short track speed skating Kalyna Roberge (St-Étienne-de-Lauzon, QC) announced today that she will be taking a year off from the sport in order to focus on her studies and personal life.
The 23 year old skater was originally planning on continuing her training closer to her hometown this season while going to school, but after a few months of training, she has decided to take a complete break from the sport.
“Speed skating has been such an important part of my life for the past 15 years that I feel I need to step back and dedicate myself to other aspects of my life before figuring out what I want to do in the future,” explained the young skater, who has been a leader of Canada’s women’s short track national team for the last four years.Read More: www.speedskating.ca/index.cfm?id=2298Tags: Kalyna Roberge / Short Track Speedskating
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Post by dose on May 21, 2011 7:34:16 GMT -8
Kalyna Roberge Returns to Speed Skating Date posted: 05/20/2011 Double Olympic medalist in short track speed skating Kalyna Roberge (St-Étienne-de-Lauzon, QC), who took a year off training and competition following the Vancouver 2010 Olympic Winter Games in order to focus on her studies, announced today that she will be returning for the 2011-12 season. The 24 year old skater took advantage of the last year to study in child care and education. Roberge also coached many young and promising skaters during this time. “Speed skating had been such an important part of my life for 15 years, I needed to step back and dedicate myself to other aspects of my life,” she explained. “During that year off, I realised I was still passionate about my sport and I still had the will to get back to training and competing, keeping the option to maybe compete in a third edition of the Olympic Games, in 2014. However the Olympics are not my ultimate goal. This time around, I want to skate for the pleasure of it, without putting any pressure on myself. I want to get back to skating simply because it’s what I love to do.” This month, the young skater will finish her school year in Québec City. After that she will join her teammates from the short track national and development teams for a high altitude training camp in Font Romeu, France. She will then spend the summer training at the Maurice-Richard Arena in Montreal in order to be ready to compete in the Fall World Cup Selections competition in September. She will spend the Fall in Québec City in order to continue her studies while following a personalized training program. Read More: www.speedskating.ca/index.cfm?id=2548
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