Go big or go home.
Carolina Hiller made that choice and it cost her dearly in Sunday's 1,000-metre junior B women's A-final at the Canadian age class short track speed skating championships.
Heading into the bell lap, Hiller made a bid to overtake Florence St-Jean of Quebec but instead caused a three-skater pileup and was disqualified for impeding.
That paved the way for St. Jean and her Quebec teammates Nomie Fallu-Dion and Jade Quevillon, who made it a clean sweep of the medals in the junior B category.
"I tried to make an inside pass and that wasn't the smartest decision and I just clipped skates with [St-Jean] and all three of us fell," said Hiller, 16. "I didn't want to be first off the start, but since there were three Quebec skaters against me they ganged up on me and I had to take the lead. I felt like I could do it and I knew I had good tactical and blocking skills, so for most of the race I was able to keep them behind me."
Hiller beat St-Jean for gold in the 1,500 m race Friday, while St-Jean won Saturday's junior B 500 m race.
Junior A 1,000 m medal favourite Lucas Hiller of Prince George, 18, was forced to sit out Sunday's races with a concussion after taking a fall in Saturday's 500 m final. Hiller watched from the stands as B.C. boy Zachery McLaren held off Alphonse Ouimette of Ontario and Guillaume Plante of Quebec to win the 1,000 A-final.
McLaren, who grew up in Port Coquitlam, now trains in Montreal where he attends Concordia University. All that time spent training with the fast guys in Quebec paid off for him on Sunday. McLaren passed Plante with three laps left and held the lead the rest of the way.
"There's a lot of depth in the racing in Quebec and I've spent the season racing against them so in competitions like this I know how they'll be racing," said McLaren, who trains with the Gadbois club, one of 25 speed skating clubs in the Montreal area.
"I was at the front in the race and it wasn't going that quick. I started to hear them behind me so I knew I had to go for it and I made my move then. I wasn't going home without a medal."
Ouimette claimed silver and Plante won bronze.
Marie-Claire Dugal of Quebec won the junior A women's 1,000 and Xavier Talbot-Cote of Quebec was the 1,000 junior B winner.
The meet results of the Hillers, Callie Swan, Alison Desmarais of Vanderhoof gave them plenty of encouragement they will make the cut for next year's Canada Winter Games. Each province and territory is allowed to send a maximum five male and five females to the Games in short track. Two B.C. team selection events will be held in the fall, likely in Richmond and Prince George. Eligible athletes must be at least 14 years old by June 30 but cannot have turned 19 by that date.
Blizzard club coach Adam Ingle was impressed with his athletes. Lucas Hiller won silver in the 1,500, Desmarais was a 1,500 bronze medalist and there were Blizzard skaters in several A and B finals in the three-day meet.
"Unfortunately Lucas got hurt [Saturday] and that changed things for us but the kids are doing really well and they actually stacked up better than I expected," said Ingle. "It showed us some things we have to work on but overall I'm very pleased. We're used to being able to skate fast, but being able to race well is a different thing and this was a good experience for our skaters here."
Nico Hiller, Carolina's twin brother, posted the 12th-best time in the junior men's (16-and-17-year-old) 3,000 m event at the weekend Canada Cup long track speed skating championships in Calgary. Hiller's time was 4:01.62. Takoto Ogawa of Japan won in 3:46.40.
