Four years after sweeping the board in the men’s 500m, Dutch sprint skaters could manage no better than seventh place at the winter Olympics in Pyeongchang.

The best-placed Dutchman, Ronald Mulder, started strongly but was overtaken by the Norwegian Harvad Lorentzen, who snatched the gold medal in an Olympic record of 34.41 seconds.

The silver medal went to Korea’s Cha Min Kyu, who was just 0.01 seconds slower, followed by Chinese skater Gao Tingyu in 34.65.

Mulder finished seventh in 34.83, with Kai Verbij ninth in 34.90 and Jan Smeekens, the silver medallist from Sochi, 10th in 34.93.

Earlier in the day the women’s team pursuit trio of Ireen Wüst, Marrit Leenstra and Antoinette de Jong set the fastest time in qualifying for the semi-finals and will race against the USA on Wednesday. Canada and Japan will contest the other semi-final.