Olympic sports roundup: Canadians get storybook endings
Catch up on what you may have missed over the weekend
It was a jam-packed weekend of high-performance sport around the world, including Laurie Blouin notching her first world title, Marianne St-Gelais coming up just short, Mark McMorris fending off Max Parrot for X Games gold, and Brad Gushue delighting his hometown St. John's crowd.
Here's a look at what you may have missed.
Gushue wins 1st Brier
It was a storybook ending for Brad Gushue, who won his first Brier in his hometown of St. John's on Sunday.
Gushue defeated Canada's Kevin Koe 7-6 after a back-and-forth affair.
Gushue had hammer in the 10th end and used it to his advantage. He hit a draw for the single point to send the raucous capacity crowd at Mile One Centre into a tizzy.
He can secure a berth in the Dec. 2-10 Olympic Trials in Ottawa if he reaches the podium at the world championship.
Blouin claims world title
Canada's Laurie Blouin scored a snowboard slopestyle world title at the world championships in Sierra Nevada, Spain, on Saturday.
The native of Stoneham, Que., scored a 78.00 on her second run, narrowly holding off New Zealand's Zoi Sadowski Synnott (77.50), as well as defending champ Miyabi Onitsuka from Japan (77.40).
Blouin landed a switch-backside 180 on her first jump, a frontside 540 on her second, a cab-900 double on her third and a backside-360 on her last jump to earn the top score.
X Games medals of every colour
There was more snowboard success on Saturday as Canadians Mark McMorris and Max Parrot finished first and second, respectively, in the big air event at the X Games in Oslo, Norway.
McMorris scored a total of 85 points for his two best runs, while Parrot was close behind with 84 points.
On Friday, Sebastien Toutant took bronze in the slopestyle competition.
You can catch all three in Building A Snowboarder's Dream, a behind-the-scenes documentary about a custom-built course created by Toutant, Mark and Craig McMorris.
Short track success
Marianne St-Gelais skated onto the podium in the 1,000-metre race at the short track world championships in the Netherlands on Sunday, but the Canadian came second to Great Britain's Elise Christie in both that race and for the overall world title.
St-Gelais had a slight lead in the overall standings after skating to silver in both the 500 and 1,500 on Saturday, but Christie came back on the final day to beat the Canadian and Shim Suk-hee of South Korea.
On the men's side, Canada's Samuel Girard finished third in the overall standings, thanks in part to a silver medal in the 1,500, while Charles Hamelin took bronze in the 1,000 en route to an eighth-overall finish.
Canadian men combine for World Cup title
Canada's long track team ended the World Cup season on a high note, clinching the men's team sprint overall title with a silver-medal finish in Stavanger, Norway.
A day prior to the overall title, Canada earned a pair of individual silver medals with Ted-Jan Bloemen in the 5,000, and Vincent De Haitre in the 1,000.
With files from The Canadian Press