Brian McKeever likes going the distance.
The 20-kilometre cross-country race is his favourite event at the World Para Nordic Skiing Championships. Not only is he good at it, he owns it.
The 39-year-old Paralympic legend from Canmore showed no signs he’s slowing down with age Sunday afternoon at Otway Nordic Centre where he and his 35-year-old guide, Graham Nishikawa, cruised to his ninth consecutive world title in the visually-impaired long-distance race and 20th career world championship medal.
“The 20K is one of our better events, at least the one that we enjoy the most. We like skiing this together and today was fun, we were in sync and when everything comes together like that it’s a pleasure racing,” said McKeever.
“Graham did such a great job guiding me and we had a great team race today. The (wax) techs in the room nailed the skis so well. It makes our jobs so much easier. It’s long climbs out there so you can’t go full-gas, you need to have some pacing in there and feel it out and I think Graham nailed that today.
“On the first climb I knew he was on it. We talked a little bit of technique in warm-up and how we should be skiing on this terrain and we put it together to a really nice rhythm and a really good pace.”
The Canadians covered the 20km course in 54:47, winning by 3:23 over silver medalists Eirik Bye and guide Arvid Nelson of Norway (58:10.2). Zebastian Modin and guide Emil Joensson of Sweden (58:03.2) won bronze.
Nishikawa, a former able-bodied national team member, says it's always difficult keeping up to McKeever but he felt great in the race and their lead was never threatened.
“Today was pretty special for us, we were both on fire and we had crazy skis,” said Nishikawa. “It was fun to ski today.”
McKeever has never lost the five km cross-country world event but it took him a few years to learn how to pace himself and win over a 20km distance.
“Part of it is age now, we’re more experienced, more miles under us, and we have the endurance and the ability to stick a good pace,” said McKeever. “It was a learning experience but now we’re very comfortable with it and very happy doing it.”
Sunday was Canada’s best day in seven days of racing at Otway with three medals, including Natalie Wilkie’s silver in the women’s standing race and Mark Arendz clinching silver in the men’s standing event.
All the medals Sunday were awarded in the Otway stadium and it was a proud moment for McKeever and Nishikawa to join a throng of Canadian supporters singing O Canada on the snow while wearing their gold maple-leaf shaped medals.
“You don’t get to do it at home very often,” McKeever said. “World championships at home, Paralympics at home, we’ve experienced both now and it’s a good feeling. It’s nice to be back in Prince George, the organizers and volunteers have been fantastic and it’s been a wonderful world championship for the whole team.”
Jesse Bachinsky of Kenora, Ont., and his guide Simon Lamarche of Victoria were 10th in McKeever’s race. Lamarche and Bachinsky lost their audio contact during the race which meant they had to rely on voice commands, but they worked it out.
The 20-year-old Bachinsky had his first big races at Otway four years ago at the Canada Winter Games and he’ll be in Red Deer this week for the his second crack at Canada Games medals.
“It’s really fast out there today and the downhills are wicked, the uphills are really technical and really good,” said Bachinsky. “It’s my favourite race course and I’m just happy to be here. It’s amazing.”
Bachinsky is part of the NextGen team of national team racers who look up to McKeever as their mentor and coach. The Canadian team did exceptionally well, winning 10 medals in Prince George (two gold, six silver, two bronze) and McKeever says seeing his younger teammates exceeding their own personal bests and climbing the world rankings will keep him racing at least until the 2020 Paralympics in Beijing.
“The big motivation is our young team that we have,” said McKeever. “You’ve got (two-time silver medalist) Natalie Wilkie and Collin (Cameron), who’s not super-young but new to the team and him winning a gold medal in the sprint off his sick bed is fun for us to watch and inspires us to keep going.”
In the women’s visually-impaired race Sunday, Caria Edlinger and guide Florian Rupert Seiwald raced to gold (54:46.6). Oksana Shyshkova and guide Vitaliy Kazakov of Ukraine won silver (59:41.8), and bronze went to Yadviha Skorabahtaya and guide Mikalai Shablouski of Belarus (1:10:22.6).
Ukraine topped the team standings with 41 medals (nine gold, 16 silver, 16 bronze) followed by the United States with 15 (six gold, seven silver, two bronze) and third-place Germany with 15 (five gold, three silver, seven bronze).
