The Olympics have just begun, and Canada is already off to a great start. As of August 4th, Canada has won four gold medals. The first gold medal won in Tokyo 2020 was by Margaret Mac Neil in the 100m butterfly. Not long after her win, another medal followed. Maude Charron won gold in 64kg women’s weightlifting. The women’s eight rowing team won another. Finally, the highly anticipated medal on August 4th was won by Toronto’s very own Andre De Grasse. Let’s look into their history with the sports prior to competing on the Olympic stage.
Margaret Mac Neil is a 21-year-old female whose home residence is in London, Ontario. She started swimming at the age of 2 and began competing with the London Aquatic Club at the age of 8. MacNeil competes collegiately at the University of Michigan. In 2019-2020 she was named the Big Ten swimmer of the year while maintaining honours. Her debut was in the FINA world championships in 2019 where she won the world title in the 100m butterfly. She has previously represented Canada at the 2018 Junior Pan Pacific Championships. This was her first Olympics and a very successful one where she took home Canada’s first gold medal! In addition to her gold in the 100m butterfly, she was able to secure a silver medal in the 4x100m medal and a bronze in the 4x100m medley relay. What an amazing way to kick it off for Canada!
Following Margert’s gold medal win, Maude Charron won Canada’s second gold medal in Olympic 64kg weightlifting category. Maude first developed a passion for weightlifting when she was 7 and began doing CrossFit. Eventually, a weightlifting coach discovered her potential and she entered her first weightlifting competition in September 2015 and later won a bronze medal at the Pan American Championships in 2017. In 2019, Charron finished 4th in the 64kg event at the Pan AM games in Lima. And in 2020 at the IWF World Cup in Rome she won silver. At the Tokyo 2020 Olympics she took a gold home for Canada. Her gold medal win was Canadas first Olympic weightlifting medal since 2012!
There is no “I” in Team and Canada’s women’s eight rowing team demonstrated that with their gold medal win on the final day of Olympic rowing in Tokyo. The women’s eight rowing team consisted of Lisa Roman Kasia Gruchalla-Wesierski, Christine Roper, Andrea Proske, Susanne Grainger, Madison Mailey, Sydney Payne, Avalon Wasteneys and Kristen Kit. This is the first medal in women’s eight team rowing since Barcelona, 1992! Way to make history ladies.
Evidently, Canada’s women were taking over the Olympic gold medals, until today in which Andre De Grasse won gold in the 200m. He set a personal best and a national record time of 19.62 seconds. This was Canada’s first Olympic gold medal in the men’s 200m in 93 years! He was also competing alongside Team Canada’s Aaron Brown, which is the first time since 1928 where Canada had two men run in the Olympic final. Learn more about Andre De Grasse.
Amazing work Team Canada! Way to make your country proud.