The 32-year-old is the most successful women's skater with three more golds in World Championships than her closest competitor, The Netherlands' Ireen Wüst at the Utah Olympic Oval and now has 20 world medals, adding four silvers to her 16 golds.

After facing opposition from another Dutch skater, Carlijn Achtereekte, she finished 0.67 seconds ahead to take the win, with Achtereekte posting a personal best. 

The world record holder was pushed hard by the Olympic champion but managed to hold it together to take the victory in a time of 3min 54.252sec.

After the top two came two Russians with Natalia Voronina rounding off the podium positions, despite a personal best from team-mate Evgeniia Lalenkova.

World record holder Canada's Ted-Jan Bloeman held off arguably the best male speed skater in history, Norway's Sven Kramer in another exciting battle for the gold in the men's 5,000m.

With just 0.54 seconds between the two, Bloeman ensured that he took his first World Championships gold medal with two silvers and a bronze already to his name in a time of 6:04.375.

Kramer is by far the most successful speed skater at the World Championships with 20 gold medals, three silvers and two bronzes.

The record number of medals of 30 is held by Germany's Claudia Pechstein, winner of five gold, 13 silver and 12 bronze, between 1996 and 2017.

Another Canadian, Graeme Fish, took the bronze with a personal best with over five seconds separating him from fourth place, Norway's Sverre Lunde Pedersen.

The Netherlands won both team gold medals in the team sprint, with the women's squad of Letitia de Jong, Femke Kok and Jutta Leerdam breaking the world record with a time of 1:24.02, nearly half-a-second ahead of silver medallists Russia, who beat Poland into third. 

In the men's race, the team of Thomas Krol, Dai Dai Ntab and Kai Verbij ensured that they matched the result of their team-mates with a close win over China in 1:18.187.

Norway won the bronze medal by a hair ahead of Japan, but the story was really about the disqualification of Canada, who posted the fastest time but had an illegal takeover.

The non-finishing Russians who would have had a fair claim for the gold too, but skater Pavel Kulizhnikov crashed out with just a few laps to go.