Canada's Valerie Maltais (L) and South Korea's Dam Min Kim compete during the ladies' 1500 m Semifinals at the ISU World Cup Short Track Speed Skating in Moscow February 4, 2012.Reuters
Canada's Valerie Maltais took bronze Saturday in women's 1,500-metre World Cup short-track speedskating.
The La Baie, Que., native finished with a time of two minutes and 31.351 seconds. South Korea's Ha-Ri Cho won gold in 2:31.162, while compatriot Eun-Byul Lee took silver in 2:31.223.
"I wanted to try a strategy that I could use at the world championships," Maltais said. "I wanted to be patient during the race, progress slowly and explode at the end. That's what I did. I'm quite satisfied."
Olivier Jean of Lachenaie, Que., qualified for the men's 1,000-metre final, but was penalized and had to settle for fourth.
Maltais, Marie-Eve Drolet of Laterriere, Que., Jessica Hewitt of Kamloops, B.C., and Marianne St. Gelais won their women's relay semifinal in a time of 4:16.317 to qualify for Sunday's final.
Jean, Charles Hamelin of Sainte-Julie, Que., and Remi Beaulieu and Francois-Louis Tremblay, both of Alma, Que., won their men's semifinal in 6:53.109 to also qualify for the final on Sunday.