Havard Lorentzen Wins 500m Speedskating Gold; Latest Women Team Pursuit Results

Norway's Havard Lorentzen set a new Olympic record to claim the gold medal in the men's 500-metre speedskating at Pyeongchang 2018 on Monday.

His time of 34.41 seconds was just 0.01 seconds faster than South Korea's Cha Min-kyu, who claimed the silver medal in front of an enthusiastic home crowd at the Gangneung Oval.

China's Gao Tingyu took the bronze with a time of 34.65 seconds. The full result can be found at Pyeongchang2018.com.

Here is the latest medal table:

Tsubasa Hasegawa's benchmark time of 35.08 set in the first of 18 pairs held strong for much of the earlier stages of the competition on Monday.

The Japanese was finally topped in the 10th pair when Dutchman Jan Smeekens crossed the finish line in 34.93, but the two competitors in the 12th pairing, including Tingyu, then both went quicker.

Min-kyu equalled the Olympic record in the 14th pair to put himself in contention for the gold, but he was just pipped to the top of the podium when Lorentzen went fastest.

His opponent in the 16th pairing, Dutchman Ronald Mulder, made a much better start, but Lorentzen then overhauled him in a brilliant finish to top the standings by the finest of margins.

None of the final four competitors troubled the top three, meaning the Norwegian took gold in speedskating's quickest event. 

In the women's team pursuit quarter-finals earlier on Monday, the Dutch team of Marrit Leenstra, Ireen Wust and Antoinette De Jong set a new Olympic record of two minutes, 55.61 seconds to ease through to the semi-finals.

Japan, Canada and the United States completed the last-four lineup, with China, Germany, South Korea and Poland missing out.