Speed skating at the 1976 Winter Olympics
The silver medal for East Germany's Andrea Ehrig-Mitscherlich was the country's first in speed skating.Sheila Young won three medals one of each value on the three shortest distances for women.The most successful male skaters were Norway's Sten Stensen and the Netherlands' Piet Kleine, who both won one gold and one silver medal, splitting the long distance events.The Dutch speed skater Hans van Helden won the bronze-medals on all the three longest distances for men.[3][4] Nineteen nations competed in the speed skating events at Innsbruck.