The 26-year-old would clock the fastest time in the women’s 500 metres event, clocking 43.693sec to ease through to the semi-final stage of the event.

South Korea’s Kim Ye Jin and Rianne de Vries of the Netherlands were the next fastest skaters in the EnergieVerbund Arena, as they achieve times of 43.858 and 44.047 respectively.

The pair will hope to continue their form tomorrow in the later stages of the event, as they seek to rival St-Gelias.

The Canadian would also finish with the second fastest 1,000m time, ending in 1min 31.467sec in the quarter-final stage of the event.

Only her team-mate Valerie Maltais would go faster, as she ended in 1:31.276.

Britain’s Elise Christie, who had been set to return to competitive action in Dresden after she opted to skip the European Championships in favour of honing her preparations for the World Championships, was absent from the competition.

The winner of the 1,000m events in Gangneung in December, stated a lack of vision due to a head injury sustained last week was behind her not competing.

In the women’s 1,500m semi-finals, Canada’s Marie-Eve Drolet achieved the fastest time by ending in 2:28.919, with Ekaterina Efremenkova second in 2:32.444.

Canadian success continued in the men’s competitions as Charle Cournoyer went fastest in the men’s 100m by clocking 1:24.538.

He was followed by John Celski, as the American finished in 1:24.783.

Canada’s Charles Hamelin posted the fastest times in both the men’s 500 quarter-finals and the 1500m semi-finals, ending the events in 41.132 and 2:10.313 respectively.

The Netherlands qualified fastest for both the women’s 3,000m and men’s 5,000m relay finals.

Action will continue tomorrow.