American Jennifer Rodriguez won the women's World Sprint Speedskating Championship yesterday in Kearns, Utah, becoming the first U.S. skater in nine years to win the event.
Rodriguez set her second straight personal best in the 500 meters and was the fastest skater in the 1,000 meters to finish with 150.015 points and the first world sprint title by an American since Chris Witty won in 1996.
American Jennifer Rodriguez races in the 500 meters. She is the first U.S. woman in nine years to win the World Sprint Speedskating Championship.
(Douglas C. Pizac -- AP)
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Rodriguez opened the day with a U.S. record of 37.94 seconds in the 500. She carried a lead of 0.14 of a second lead into the 1,000, and had a chance for a dramatic finish in the final pairing.
Rodriguez beat Japan's Sayuri Yoshii in the final race with a time of 1 minute 14.18 seconds, the fastest time of the day by nearly a third of a second and more than enough to win the overall title.
"I still can't believe I'm a world champion right now," Rodriguez said. "I love racing here for my home crowd on my home track."
Anzhelika Kotyuga of Belarus was second with 150.415 points, followed by Sabine Volker of Germany (150.425).
The Netherlands' Erben Wennemars defended his men's title with 137.310 points, edging Canadian Jeremy Wotherspoon (137.820) and American Joey Cheek (137.975).
U.S. skater Shani Davis had the second-best 1,000 time of the day at 1:07.67, 0.21 behind Wennemars's time.
• SKIING: Austria's Manfred Pranger captured his first World Cup victory in the slalom while Benjamin Raich cut Bode Miller's lead in the chase for the overall title in Kitzbuehel, Austria.
Pranger covered the two runs in 1:31.51. Countryman Mario Matt was runner-up and Croatia's Ivica Kostelic finished third.
Miller lost his balance and failed to join the top 30 for the second leg. He nearly swerved off course a few gates from the bottom and was forced to finish the gates from the reverse direction, leaving him 2.11 seconds off the pace.
"I was getting stuck a lot," Miller said. "The snow changes the whole way down. It's little parts of really grippy snow and little parts of icy snow."
Raich finished eighth and earned 32 points, leaving him 166 behind Miller. Miller, who leads with 1,048, earned 60 points in the last four races
The top U.S. skier was Ted Ligety in 12th place. . . .
