Elise Christie accused her Korean rival Shim Suk-Hee of unsporting behaviour after the Scot missed out on a medal - she finished fourth - in her favoured 1000 metres at the Short Track Speed Skating World Championships in Montreal yesterday, writes Christopher Sweeney.
The Livingston girl was dismayed that the referee did not call a clear push on the Scot, by Shim, the world record holder and eventual winner.
Christie, 23, said: "I got hit and there should have been a call for it, but there wasn't. After she hit me, I couldn't get the speed back up again. To give a hit that early on in a race, it's not really a sportsmanly type thing to do, but she did it and, fair dos, she got a medal today. It worked for her but unfortunately it didn't work for me."
Christie, who had secured a silver behind another Korean, Park Seung-Hi, in the 500m on Saturday, felt the officials at Montreal's Maurice Richard arena were too lenient, in contrast to the Sochi Winter Olympics, where she was disqualified in all three events for infringements. "I got disqualified for less than that; she's pushed me off the track almost; that's why I am finding it harder than normal. I'll talk to her about it when I see her, but there's nothing I can do to change it; I've just got to deal with it."
Christie battled back bravely after the push and only finished three-tenths of a second behind Shim. That followed impressive displays in the qualifying rounds, where she oozed class and cruised through.
Her lack of extra speed in the final may have also been down to her exploits in the 500m on Saturday. She said: "I have never done as much racing in a World Championships as I did over this weekend, so I was quite tired. I guess doing all those 500s might have taken it out of me. I am not used to doing that; I am usually a bit fresher in the 1000m. But it's still been my most successful championships ever and I have got a lot to move forward with."
Christie finished fourth in the overall classification with 36 points, from her fifth in Friday's 1500m and seventh spot in the 3000m. It was all done on two right skates, after both her left blades were broken during the journey to Canada. After the heartache of Sochi and having received death threats on Twitter from irate Chinese fans, she admitted she needs a break from the sport and is looking to take time off.
"I never thought about giving it up," she said. "I have learnt a lot this year and hopefully I'll move forward. I want to take a couple of weeks off but I've not discussed it with my manager yet.
"I need a mental break from skating."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article