Chad Hedrick has qualified to skate in five events in the Turin Olympics.
In the process of qualifying, Hedrick set a world record in the 10,000 meters. His time of 12 minutes, 55.11 seconds beat the old record by nearly 3 seconds. In that race, Hedrick won by nearly a minute over second-place Charles Leveille.
Hedrick has qualified for the Olympics in the 1,000, 1,500, 5,000 and 10,000. He also is expected to compete in team pursuit, a new event.
Hedrick is one of those interesting Olympic stories. He’s a former inline skating champion who only switched to skating on the ice in 2002.
I had never heard of Chad Hedrick until recently, but he’s now a favorite of mine. He’s from Spring, Texas, which is only about 20 minutes from where I live. Got to love a hometown boy in the Olympics!