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A few things for Canadian fans to keep an eye on:
Alpine skiing: Don’t stop the party
Last weekend, Jack Crawford became the first Canadian in 42 years to win the famed Kitzbühel downhill in Austria, and Cam Alexander joined him on the podium by taking bronze. The boys partied like it was 1983, repairing to the beloved Londoner pub for some (OK, lots of) shirtless beer-chugging in keeping with the tradition started by Todd Brooker and the Crazy Canucks when they won at Kitzbuhel in the early 1980s.
Assuming their hangovers have worn off, Crawford and Alexander should contend for the podium again in Sunday’s World Cup men’s downhill in Germany. It’s the final race before the alpine world championships get started on Tuesday in Austria. There, Crawford will defend the super-G title he won at the most recent worlds, in 2023 in France, where Alexander was the downhill bronze medallist.
The final women’s alpine race before the world championships happened yesterday in France, where American star Mikaela Shiffrin finished 10th in the slalom in her return from the nasty puncture-wound injury that sidelined her for two months.
WATCH l CBC Sports previews what to watch over the weekend:
Our CBC Sports team previews what you should be watching this week in sports.
Freestyle skiing: The King has returned
Canadian moguls star Mikaël Kingsbury is back in his home province of Quebec for a pair of World Cup competitions at Val Saint-Côme. The 2018 Olympic gold medallist and eight-time world champ will compete in the men’s moguls tonight and the dual moguls on Saturday night.
Kingsbury swept those events at last week’s tour stop in New Hampshire, giving him four wins in six starts this season and extending his all-time World Cup wins record to 94.
On the women’s side, Canada’s Maia Schwinghammer ranks third in the overall moguls standings after placing fourth in both competitions last week. She has five top-four finishes in six starts this season but still only one medal — a bronze back in December.
Elsewhere in freestyle, Canada’s ski cross racers will try to continue their success at a World Cup stop in Switzerland. India Sherret and 2014 Olympic champ Marielle Thompson rank first and third in the women’s standings, while Reece Howden and Kevin Drury are fifth and sixth in the men’s. There are men’s and women’s competitions on both Saturday and Sunday.
Meanwhile, many of the halfpipe, slopestyle and big air skiers and snowboarders who competed in last week’s Winter X Games in Aspen, Colo., are sticking around for a bunch of World Cup events there. Canada’s Cassie Sharpe, back from a two-year break during which the 2018 Olympic gold medallist became a mom, is competing in the ski halfpipe after winning her first X Games title since 2019.
Speed skating: Jordan rules
Canada’s long track skaters picked up just one medal at last week’s World Cup stop in Calgary after winning a national-record 10 at last year’s world single distances championships there. On the bright side, it was a gold, as Ivanie Blondin, Carolina Hiller and Béatrice Lamarche raced to victory in the non-Olympic women’s team sprint.
The World Cup tour continues tonight through Sunday in Milwaukee, where American phenom Jordan Stolz will be the star of the show. The 20-year-old Wisconsinite is undefeated this season, winning 11 more World Cup gold medals (at distances ranging from 500-1,500m) to go with his six single-distance world titles and the world allround championship he captured last year. Here’s more from CBC Sports’ Devin Heroux on the man who’s poised to become a household name at next year’s Olympics.
Other stuff to watch
Three-time Olympic golfer Brooke Henderson is among the 32 women competing in the season-opening Tournament of Champions in Orlando, Fla., for LPGA Tour winners from the past two years. Henderson, who captured the last of her 13 career titles at this event in 2023, was in the middle of the pack at our publish time. Here’s an updated leaderboard.
The top men’s golfers are at Pebble Beach for one of the PGA Tour’s $20-million US “signature” events. Olympians Nick Taylor, Corey Conners and Mackenzie Hughes are part of the Canadian contingent along with Taylor Pendrith and Adam Hadwin. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler of the United States is playing for the first time this year after cutting his hand while making Christmas dinner. The 2024 Olympic gold medallist explained that he was using a wine glass to carve out ravioli from a piece of homemade dough when the glass broke and sliced his right hand pretty badly. Here’s a live Pebble Beach leaderboard.
Sprinter Audrey Leduc, the Canadian record holder in the women’s 100m and 200m, will race the 60m at Sunday’s New Balance Indoor Grand Prix in Boston. The men’s 60m features American star Noah Lyles in his first race since winning 100m gold at the Paris Olympics. He’ll face 2021 Olympic champ Marcell Jacobs of Italy.
In tennis, Canada faces Hungary in a first-round Davis Cup qualifier on Saturday and Sunday in Montreal. Felix Auger-Aliassime opted out and Denis Shapovalov is nursing a back injury, leaving the Canadian men without their top two singles players. 85th-ranked Gabriel Diallo and No. 176 Alexis Galarneau were picked to play singles for Canada.
How to watch
The Davis Cup qualifier and all of the winter sports mentioned above can be seen live on CBCSports.ca and CBC Gem. On Saturday, the CBC TV network is showing the moguls events at Val Saint-Côme right after a PWHL game between Ottawa and Toronto at 2 p.m. ET. Here’s the full streaming and broadcast schedule.
