Fredericton speed skater to compete at 2026 Winter Olympics

Rikki Doak is one of the first New Brunswick speed skaters to make Team Canada since 2000. (Submitted: Rikki Doak)

A Fredericton short-track speed skater will be competing at the sport’s highest level this week. 

Rikki Doak, 27, will be racing for Team Canada in the women’s 3000m relay at the Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics. 

“I think it's kind of like surreal … to wear the maple leaf is just something I've always wanted to do and at the Olympic stage is even a bigger deal,” she said. “I'm really excited— I'm very proud to represent Canada and I just want to make Canada proud as well.”

Doak previously took part in the 2025 World Championships in Beijing, where she won the gold medal in the 3000m relay.

She began speed skating at around four years old, following in her older brother’s and uncle’s footsteps. She started to train in Montreal during the summer of 2015, before moving to the city in 2017. 

Doak said that most New Brunswick skaters leave the province if they want to continue their careers, due to the province’s limited resources. Her teammate, Courtney Sarault, is from Moncton, N.B.

“There's not a lot of Olympians that come from a small province,” she said. “I think just [N.B.] being a small province, it was hard to get good training. But I had a lucky year and I had a lot of training partners and help.”

To prepare for the games, she trains every day of the week except for Sunday. Her team practices on the ice twice a day, at least five days a week. The rest of her workout schedule is cardio training.

Doak celebrating her 500m silver medal win at the 2025 Beijing World Championship. (Submitted: Rikki Doak)

She thinks that her stiffest competition will come from the Dutch and Korean teams. She also thinks that the Italians will have an extra boost due to the home crowd. 

Doak learned she made the Canadian Olympic Team while on vacation in Mexico with other skaters. They were all sitting together, supporting each other while they were individually getting phone calls confirming their place.

At first, she was worried she wouldn’t receive a call. She had suffered a concussion during practice last summer and had been sidelined for nearly a month. 

“I was just kind of scared that they didn't see what I can do,” she said. “But when I got the call, I was over the moon. They were like, ‘even if we didn't see much this year, we saw the past four years.’”

When asked what the opening ceremonies were like, Doak said that the experience was “insane.”

Along with her fellow speed-skating teammates, she was one of the first Canadian athletes to walk out into the stadium in Milan.  

“It was just like a dream, a dream come true,” she said. “It was beautiful, there were around 60,000 people in the stadium. It was loud, there were lights everywhere, along with the rings shining in gold.”

Her family was excited to hear the news that she made the team. She believes that they’ve put in as much work as she has, considering the sacrifices they’ve made for her success. 

“I think when I was five years old, I remember watching [the Olympics] in my basement, and I told my parents that could be me,” she said. 

“I feel when you talk to any athlete, this is the highest goal— the best all come here. So for me, that was my long-term goal. I don't think there's anything higher than [the] Olympics right now.”