Just across the street from Carleton University is Brewer Park — home to the 400-metre outdoor speed skating oval where Olympic gold medalists Isabelle Weidemann and Ivanie Blondin got their start.
The athletes skated with the Gloucester Concordes, a speed skating club in Ottawa founded in 1989. Former Concordes head coach Mike Rivet trained Weidemann and Blondin on the Brewer Park Oval.
Along with Valérie Maltais, Weidemann and Blondin won gold in the women’s team pursuit at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games on Tuesday, making the Canadian trio back-to-back gold medalists.
The Charlatan spoke with Mike Rivet to learn more about his time as a coach, the local speed skating community and what it felt like to watch his former students skate to gold.
The Charlatan (TC): When and why did you start coaching?
Mike Rivet (MR): I started coaching because I had a great coach as a young, developing skater. My coach was a gentleman from the Netherlands who came over to Canada in 1967. He was a great coach, Tony Winterink. He brought out the best qualities in me as an athlete.
I’ve been coaching for probably 35 years now. I worked with the Ottawa Pacers for a while. When I lived in Sault Ste. Marie, I was coaching with the Sault Ste. Marie Speed Skating Club, so I’ve had different places to work.
TC: When did you start coaching Isabelle Weidemann and Ivanie Blondin?
MR: Ivanie was eight years old then, so 27 years ago. Isabelle was 11 years old and she’s now 30, so that’s 19 years.
When you work with the athletes, you get to know them quite well. Ivanie, for example, was very much feisty and a goal-getter, while Isabelle is a very focus-oriented individual. They have very different styles. It’s very cool that they ended up on the same team.
TC: How did it feel to see Isabelle and Ivanie win gold with Valérie this week?
MR: That’s pretty exciting to have two local kids — first of all, make it to the Olympics — and then repeat a gold medal performance.
The relationship with the athletes at this level is very different. You’ve gone through the highs, and you’ve gone through the lows. You’ve gone through severe hardship because to get to the level they’re at, it wasn’t always rosy. It was not easy all the way through — you had a lot of ups and downs in this process.
We understand that being on the positive side is about one-third of your athletic career.
TC: You’ve mentioned the Brewer Park Oval is the only Olympic-sized outdoor speed skating oval in Ontario. Can you tell me about the issues surrounding this lack of facilities?
MR: It requires a willingness from the municipalities. Brewer Park is maintained and taken care of by the local speed skating clubs, so it’s not run by the city. The city does provide some funding, but most of the work is done through a group of volunteers.
We’re working on a field that’s not flat to start with, and we’re working with a really substandard clubhouse, so you are working with a deficit before you even start.
But we’re able to get a pool of skaters and to get so many athletes on the national team from Ottawa. That tells you the willingness from the local clubs to work hard to get a place for these guys to practice is pretty amazing.
TC: In 2018, speed skating organizations in Ottawa put together a pitch to refrigerate the oval. Can you tell me about that?
MR: We were trying to demonstrate that our athletes need a place to train and a place to go to school.
It’s not always good for kids to be away from their family. They need a support team. Having your family here and close friends is very important for students to excel. If you’re relocated away from home, away from your friends, that’s another challenge that we’re adding to the equation.
TC: What more can be done to support local aspiring athletes?
MR: We would like to see the city put forward some of their ideas to enhance the training opportunities for athletes. Ottawa has two universities and also has two colleges. We have great opportunities for developing on the academic side of skating.
There’s things that we can do quite easily. In the Netherlands, for example, they actually have a track that they set up on a flat surface. They put water on the track, and as soon as it gets cold enough, the water freezes. In Ottawa, we have to wait for a snow base in order to start building the ice. Having the snow base is a challenge for us because we have to wait for Mother Nature.
Having the city provide a facility with a flat surface and a method of holding back water in there — our athletes would be doubling the number of days available to train.
We had a special year this year because we were actually open before the new year. I had not seen this in probably 15 years.
TC: What’s the importance of creating opportunities for people to try speed skating?
MR: It’s a sport that you can take up at any age. The beauty about it is that you can start late, and you can continue to excel. It’s one of the sports where you can actually skate for a long time — it’s easy on the body. That’s why there’s an increasing amount of older skaters and master skaters who enjoy this as a lifelong sport.
TC: What’s most fulfilling about coaching speed skaters in Ottawa?
MR: Having the opportunity to look at athletes, to develop athletes and to see the fruit of your work is pretty amazing. You take them from being, you know, an eight-year-old kid and then watch them reach the top of their capacity.
Whenever you get the chance to work with someone and to see them excel and improve, to see them enjoying what they’re doing, regardless of what the level is, that’s the exciting part.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Featured image by Iya Mendoza
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