It's the fastest human-powered winter sport and Canadians are leading the charge. The CBC’s Omar Dabaghi-Pacheco laced up his skates and took the ice to find out how hard speed skating really is.

Ottawa

Long track speed skating is recognized as the fastest human-powered sport, with Canadians achieving significant success, including 42 Olympic medals—the most for the country in any Winter Olympic discipline. The sport, held on a 400-meter oval, features events ranging from 500-meter sprints to 10,000-meter races and requires athletes to endure intense physical strain, particularly from lactic acid build-up in the legs.

CBC News reporter Omar Dabaghi-Pacheco, despite limited skating experience and a prosthetic hip, undertook a season of speed skating lessons to better understand the sport's challenges and appeal. Interviews with Canadian Olympic champions and coaches highlighted the sport's passionate community, its accessibility across Canada, and the technical differences from hockey. As the 2026 Winter Olympics approach, the segment offers insights for new fans and aspiring skaters.

How tough is the fastest human-powered Olympic sport?

It's the fastest human-powered sport on earth, and Canadians are really, really good at it. Long track speed skating. I'm going to be one of the people bringing you CBC coverage from the 2026 Winter Olympic Games, and I wanted to find out how tough speed skating really is. That feeling where your legs are full of lactic acid and they really cannot move anymore, but you need another push. And then another. And then another. And then it doesn't stop. That's the pain train, yeah. Oh man. Okay, so I don't know how to skate. I got a prosthetic hip, and I'm entirely out of my comfort zone here. I have not really skated since I was a kid. So why did I sign up for a season of speed skating lessons? One, I like a good challenge. Two, I want to have a sense of what it feels like for those athletes around those corners. And three, it's really, really fun. I have no idea what happens if you bail while catapulting around those corners. So I'm hoping not to find out that hard way. Oh, and this ice is home to the Gloucester Concords, the original training grounds where gold medalists Isabelle Wiedemann and Yvanne Blondin got their start. It's where I'm figuring this sport out too, but I've got a lot of questions. And with the Winter Games ever so close, you're about to see a lot of long track speed skating, and you probably have some questions too. So here's a primer. Canadian long track speed skaters have won 42 Olympic medals. That's more medals than in any other Winter Olympic sport. A 400-meter oval, individual distance events, from a 500-meter sprint to a 10,000-meter long haul, this sport is all about power, speed, and endurance. And Canadians are some of the best in the world. Just look at the Team Pursuit, where Canadian women are the reigning Olympic champions. I caught up with two of them at the World Cup stop in Calgary. A lot of people are going to be watching speed skating this Olympic season. They might want to get into it. Newbies, why do you love this sport, and why would you tell people to get into it? Well, we've got clubs across Canada. In every small town, there seems to be a small little speed skating club run by volunteers, by moms and dads that have loved this sport for a long time, gotten their kids involved. It's just a really incredible community sport with a lot of really passionate people involved. And so, yeah, I recommend anybody going out, learn to skate. Best tip for a newbie? Oh, keep your knees forward. Knees forward. Knees forward. Olympics are a chance to bring new fans into the sport, and some may find out it's not as easy as our top athletes make it look. I think they believe that it might be easier to pick up from hockey than it is, but a lot of times the skating technique is quite a bit different, and how you use the blades and how the blades are actually engineered is different, so you end up with a very different type of skating. From personal experience, the thing that I noticed when I first came out is the forces you feel in a turn, especially in short track, when you really get going, you get a bit of momentum, you feel quite a bit of forces pushing you outwards as you're going around, but also you feel this kind of zip effect as you go around the corner, and that can be quite exhilarating. Let me tell you first hand, it's a lot to process, especially if you, like me, have very limited experience on skates. Okay, it was bound to happen, it was bound to happen sooner or later. Not as bad as I thought it would be though, and my hip is still intact so I'm good. One of the things I love about the Olympics is this idea of testing yourself against your own limits and trying to see how much better you can get. Now I've got a lot of runway, but for Canada's athletes, looking at Milano Cortina 2026, just around the corner. Omar Dabaghi-Pacheco, CBC News, Ottawa.

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