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World Single Distances Speed Skating Championships

Series of speed skating competitions

The World Single Distances Speed Skating Championships are a series of speed skating competitions organised by the International Skating Union.

History

Since the late 19th century, speed skating championships were always decided by racing multiple distances – four different distances for the Allround Championships, and two different distances (which have to be skated twice) for Sprint Championships. However, the speed skating events at the Olympic Games were always individual distances, no medals are awarded for a combined event (the only exception being the 1924 Winter Olympics).

Towards the end of the 20th century, skaters started to specialize and it became rare that a skater was able to dominate both the short and the long distances. Perhaps the last skater able to do so was Eric Heiden, who won all five distances at the 1980 Winter Olympics. As a consequence of this specialization, the difference between the Olympic Games and the regular championships, and the popularity of both the Speed skating World Cup and Single Distance Championships held nationally in several countries, the International Skating Union decided to organise the World Single Distance Championships.

Starting in 1996, this originally was an annual event, but in 1998 it became clear that having World Single Distance Championships and the Single Distance Championships as held at the Winter Olympics during the same year was too much, so since 1999, the World Single Distance Championships are no longer held in (Winter) Olympic years.

Distances

The skaters compete in the following distances:

Men	Women	Notes
500 m	500 m
1,000 m	1,000 m
1,500 m	1,500 m
5,000 m	3,000 m
10,000 m	5,000 m
Team pursuit	Team pursuit	(since 2005)
Mass start	Mass start	(since 2015)
Team sprint	Team sprint	(2019–2020, since 2023)

Summary

ISU Single Distances Championships	Number	Year	Country
1	1996	Hamar	10
2	1997	Warsaw	10
3	1998	Calgary	10
4	1999	Heerenveen	10
5	2000	Nagano	10
6	2001	Salt Lake City	10
7	2003	Berlin	10
8	2004	Seoul	10
9	2005	Inzell	12
10	2007	Salt Lake City	12
11	2008	Nagano	12
12	2009	Richmond	12
13	2011	Inzell	12
14	2012	Heerenveen	12
15	2013	Sochi	12
16	2015	Heerenveen	14
17	2016	Kolomna	14
18	2017	Gangneung	14
19	2019	Inzell	16
20	2020	Salt Lake City	16
21	2021	Heerenveen	14
22	2023	Heerenveen	16
23	2024	Calgary	16
24	2025	Hamar	16

Medal summary

The medal table by nations is the total number of the 16 distances (men and women) at all of the 23 championships (1996–2025). The individual tables are about the eight distances by gender.

Nations

All medals, click on the nation to go to the list of medallists.

Updated after the 2025 World Championships.

Men

Top 10, including team pursuit and team sprint. Boldface denotes active skaters and highest medal count among all skaters (including those who are not included in these tables) per type.

Rank	Skater	Country	From	To	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Sven Kramer		2007	2020	21	3	2	26
2	Shani Davis		2004	2015	8	4	3	15
3	Bob de Jong		1997	2013	7	8	5	20
4	Gianni Romme		1996	2004	7	2	3	12
5	Erben Wennemars		1999	2008	6	2	3	11
6	Jordan Stolz		2023	2025	6	2	1	9
7	Jorrit Bergsma		2012	2023	5	8	–	13
8	Carl Verheijen		2001	2009	5	5	3	13
9	Hiroyasu Shimizu		1996	2005	5	3	2	10
10	Pavel Kulizhnikov	Russian Skating Union	2015	2021	5	3	1	9

Women

Top 10, including team pursuit and team sprint. Boldface denotes active skaters and highest medal count among all skaters (including those who are not included in these tables) per type.

Rank	Skater	From	To	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Martina Sáblíková	2007	2025	16	7	4	27
2	Ireen Wüst	2007	2021	15	15	1	31
3	Anni Friesinger	1997	2009	12	9	1	22
4	Gunda Niemann-Stirnemann	1996	2001	11	3	–	14
5	Irene Schouten	2015	2024	8	2	5	15
6	Christine Nesbitt	2007	2013	7	2	3	12
7	Antoinette Rijpma-de Jong	2016	2025	6	5	2	13
8	Miho Takagi	2015	2025	6	4	6	16
9	Claudia Pechstein	1996	2017	5	13	12	30
10	Ivanie Blondin	2015	2025	5	9	3	17

References

"ISU World Single Distances Speed Skating Championships 2016, Kolomna, Russia". [[International Skating Union]].
"ISU World Single Distances Speed Skating Championships 2017, Gangneung, Korea". [[International Skating Union]].
"ISU World Single Distances Speed Skating Championships, 2019 Inzell, Germany". [[International Skating Union]].

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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