Kramer wins third straight 5,000m gold

PyeongChang : Dutch speed skater Sven Kramer set a new Olympic record to secure a hat-trick of titles in the men’s 5,000m.

Kramer, 31, looked comfortable in his heat and went ahead of the pace set by Canada’s Ted-Jan Bloemen with four laps to go. He maintained his advantage to finish in six minutes 9.76 seconds.

Bloemen, a former team-mate of Kramer before switching nationality in 2015, was 1.85 seconds back with bronze going to Norway’s Sverre Lunde Pedersen.

Bloemen and Pedersen could only be separated by two-hundredths of a second after they fought out a tremendous battle in their heat.