Message from the Editor: Ottawa Sports Pages Fund Campaign
We are now well into our Ottawa at the Olympics coverage, with several exciting days still ahead – we hope you’ve enjoyed the ride so far!
Much like our local athletes themselves, the Olympic Games give our Ottawa Sports Pages reporting team a big energy boost to keep on delivering local sports news.
We’d like to take a moment to share a little more about what drives us, and also how you can help fuel those efforts.
We love the Games and we love highlighting these dedicated athletes during the Olympics – this is the pinnacle moment of many careers! But our mission is really to showcase their efforts four years out of four, to cover athletes from the grassroots up to top levels, and to celebrate our local sports community’s achievements.
We want to fill the void that legacy media have created by largely abandoning the amateur and community sport beat over many years. It is nice to have an inundation of stories on Canadian Olympians during the Games, but even then, if you’re not on the podium, you’re probably not in the mainstream press.
Of course, we know there’s so much more to the Olympic experience than winning medals.
As gymnast Sam Zakutney shared in our coverage from yesterday, it’s about the whole journey to get there, triumphing over challenges and adversity, the camaraderie built with teammates, the support from family, friends and coaches, and inspiring young people watching to be their best.
Sam is an athlete who’s been featured in the Ottawa Sports Pages since our earliest days back in 2011 and it’s been such a pleasure to follow his rise up the ranks.
Our Executive Director Dan Plouffe remembers first interviewing Sam, not yet a teenager, and meeting a boy who was already exceptionally mature and well-spoken beyond his years (yep, he’s gone on to earn his engineering ring as well as those Olympic rings…)
Sam was training over 20 hours a week then, and he was already encountering the stress of performing under pressure (at the time, it was for the provincials, now it’s the biggest stage in sport).
We were fortunate to get to see Sam win several national titles in town and then secure his ticket to the Olympics nearby in Gatineau, all of which made headlines in the Sports Pages.
After one of our stories, we were tickled to have Sam’s parents share what our work meant to them:
“You have given Sam so much exposure and also inspiration and confidence in himself with your articles. Thank you so much for your hard work and dedication to all amateur athletes in the Ottawa area. It is your work that gives them the energy to continue. It also lets everybody in Ottawa know just how many fantastic athletes we have.”
That’s the kind of message that inspires us! We’ve also had parents of athletes to tell us that our coverage has helped their kids secure sponsorships to help their pursuits, which we love to hear too since we know how important that is in amateur sport.
Fundraising is critical to not-for-profit independent media organizations like ours too, and with that, we’d like to invite you to contribute to the Ottawa Sports Pages Fund to support local sports journalism:
Our fundraising campaign kicks off today and will run through to the end of the Games.
With rising costs and decreased advertising revenues, it’s become increasingly difficult for Canadian journalism organizations to survive and thrive, perhaps doubly challenging for small operations like ours. That makes financial support from our readers especially crucial in allowing us to deliver the news.
If you, like us, believe in showcasing Ottawa’s amateur athletes and encouraging them to shine, please consider donating if you are able. All online contributions made via OCF-FCO.ca/Ottawa-Sports-Pages-Fund/ are eligible for a charitable donation tax receipt.
For $10 per month (or more if desired, or any one-time contribution), you will help us to keep on telling the type of great stories we’ve seen unfold in Paris, and from the local gyms, courts, fields and pools on the road up.
Together, we can keep giving our local athletes the recognition and support they deserve!
Thank you very much for your consideration.
– Dan Plouffe, Ottawa Sports Pages Executive Director
OATO Day 13: Another record for Jacqueline Madogo as Canada runs its fastest women’s 4×100 relay ever
This coverage was first sent as an email newsletter to our subscribers. Sign up to receive it, for free, on our Ottawa at the Olympics page.
Newsletter By Jackson Starr, Martin Cleary, Adam Beauchemin, Dan Plouffe & Kaitlyn LeBoutillier
It has been records galore for Jacqueline Madogo so far on the track at Stade de France in the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. After two personal-bests individually earlier in the meet, Madogo returned to the track today for the women’s 4×100-metre relay and set a national record alongside her teammates. Canada finished with a time of 42.50 seconds, good enough to qualify for the final tomorrow.
“I was talking with my coach yesterday and we all said we’ll need a national record to advance to the final,” Madogo said via the Canadian Olympic Committee, in French. “When I saw 42.51, I knew it was a national record. I didn’t know if the girls knew or not, so I was like ‘guys, we broke the national record!’ when I saw that I was sure we were in the finals.”
Madogo received the baton second in the relay, getting the handoff from Sade McCreath, and handing it off to Marie-Eloise Leclair. Gatineau’s Audrey Leduc finished the race off for the Canadians and pulled them into fourth place. That was outside the automatic top-3 qualifying finishers in their heat, but it was the next-fastest time, which secured them a place on the start line for tomorrow’s final.
Madogo completed her 100 m running-start segment in 10.28, ranked fifth among the race’s eight second-leg runners. The 24-year-old Olympic rookie was tasked with building pace down the back straight, which she did well by holding firm alongside Great Britain who were in the next lane over.
Leduc posted the best time of all anchor runners at 10.04 to move the Canadians up from seventh to fourth in the tight competition, establishing a new national benchmark in the process.
The previous Canadian record of 42.60 was set in 2015. The last time Canada medalled in the discipline was 1984, and 2016 was the team’s only other appearance in the final in between, when it finished seventh.
“We communicate really well and that’s what’s brought us here and (is) making us excel,” Madogo said on CBC. “I’m glad that we’re putting the [Canadian women’s] relay program back on the map.
“It’s been a long ride for the women’s 4×100 in Canada … but now we’re in the Olympic final.”
Adjibi not in race, but men’s relay team advances to final
While Canadian men’s 4×100 m relay team member Eliezer Adjibi of Ottawa was not selected as one of the four athletes to race in today’s semis, his team did advance to the final with a third-place finish in its heat.
The 2022 world-champion lineup of Aaron Brown, Jerome Blake, Brendon Rodney and Andre De Grasse were the four sprinters out there for Canada and finished with a time of 38.39.
While third was all it took to get to the final, Canada finished within .05 of second-place France, and .15 back of China in the tight race. Canada will now race in the final on Friday afternoon, with Adjibi still eligible to sub in if needed.
Besharah-Hrebacka and Davison fall short of K-4 500 m final
Rideau Canoe Club paddlers Toshka Besharah-Hrebacka and Natalie Davison, along with their teammates Riley Marie Melanson and Courtney Stott, missed out on the final of the women’s kayak four 500 m event.
On a slightly overcast day at Vaires-sur-Marne Nautical Stadium, the team finished with a time of 1:39.24, which placed them fourth of four in the semi-final round, with a top-2 placement required to move to the final.
Canada finished 3.99 seconds behind third-place Serbia, and 4.47 behind Norway for a spot in the final. Serbia and Norway were in a close race for the second spot, while Australia found a way to maintain its pace throughout the race and win, despite a late surge from the Norwegians.
Canada was still in it come the middle of the race after a start that placed them in a spot to pick up a place or two, but both Norway and Serbia picked up their pace and Canada could not respond.
While the loss brings Besharah-Hrebacka’s debut Olympics to a close, Davison will still be competing in the kayak doubles 500 m race tomorrow.
Sophia Jensen of Chelsea, QC won her women’s canoe 200 m heat to qualify directly for the semifinals in her event.
Gaudreault and water polo team to play for 7th
Jessica Gaudreault and the Canadian women’s water polo team lost 10-5 against Italy on Thursday morning in the first game of the 5-8 classification round.
The match started off close with tight defence as the teams were tied 1-1 after the first quarter. But as it has been throughout the tournament, it was once again the second frame which plagued Canada. The team was outscored 4-1 in the second quarter.
Canada was able to bridge the gap in the third and close it back to a 6-5 scoreline, making it close going into the fourth. In the fourth quarter though, Italy found another level in both the offensive and defensive halves, outscoring Canada 4-0 in the frame to take the game 10-5.
Gaudreault made 11 saves in the contest, five of which came in the defensively-driven first quarter. It was however, a difficult showing the rest of the way for Canada on the defensive side, conceding 10 goals overall while being outshot 21-15.
Canada will now face Greece in the 7-8 matchup, looking to find its second win of the tournament and salvage seventh place in the final match of its tournament.
Ottawa Olympians in action on August 9:
Preview: Lauren Gale back on the track for 4×400 m relay
After finishing 24th overall in the women’s 400 m on Tuesday, Lauren Gale of the Ottawa Lions Track and Field Club gets another crack at things as part of the 4×400 m relay on Friday.
While she was not able to qualify for the semifinals in her individual competitions, Gale did say before the games in an interview with Ottawa Sports Pages reporter Jackson Starr that her goal was to “medal in the 4×4 with our team.”
Canada had great showings to finish fourth in the discipline in the last two Olympics, including the most recent Games in Tokyo where Gale served as a relay team alternate.
The 24-year-old and Team Canada will first need to qualify for the final through tomorrow’s semis, where a top-3 heat finish is required to move on, or one of the next-best two times among those not automatically qualified.
Gale noted after her individual race via Athletics Canada that she’d “lost a lot of weight and just ran with a lot of heart today more so than legs” and was just cleared to race the day before her event after presumably battling an illness.
Track cyclist Ariane Bonhomme also fought a stomach bug in the lead-up to her first event of the Games as she had the Canadian women’s pursuit team placed eighth.
She’ll now compete in the madison event alongside her pursuit teammate Maggie Coles-Lyster, although the 120-lap discipline is not one Canada focuses much energy towards.
Bonhomme told the National Post that she and Coles-Lyster tried to pull out of the madison ahead of the Games, but Cycling Canada noted that Coles-Lyster then wouldn’t have been able to compete in the omnium, so they stayed in.
“Our main goal is to make sure that she doesn’t crash and she doesn’t hurt herself and she is in the best shape possible,” Bonhomme said. “I’m still excited. I think if it can inspire someone somewhere, a little girl watching us and being like: ‘Damn, I want to go to the Olympics and do better than they did,’ I will be happy.”
After successfully advancing through the quarterfinals, Natalie Davison will be back on the water for the women’s kayak doubles 500 m event alongside Courtney Stott of Pickering. They will line up in lane eight for the first of two semifinal races. The top-4 in each heat will advance to the A final, to be held a few hours later tomorrow.
The duo had previously finished with a time of 1:44.35 to finish third in the heat events, followed by a stronger 1:42.58 in the quarterfinals to help get to this point.
Davison is coming off of today’s fourth-place result in the semifinal of the women’s four event alongside fellow Rideau Canoe Club paddler Toshka Besharah-Hrebacka.
Madogo after more magic
Jacqueline Madogo keeps rising higher and higher at the 2024 Olympics, and she’ll have a chance to leave an even bigger mark when she competes in the women’s 4×100 m final tomorrow in Paris.
Madogo was all smiles throughout different portions of today’s semifinal race as Canada set a new national record. First when she was introduced before the start, then after the race when she was celebrating with her teammates.
This comes after previously setting personal bests in both the solo 200 m qualifiers and repechage, which qualified her for the semifinals later that day. Prior to the Games, Madogo’s joy was already bubbling.
“I want to enjoy every bit of it,” she said in an interview with the Sports Pages’ Jackson Starr. “I definitely want to go out there competitive (and) put myself out there, put my best foot forward during every single race.
“Once you get to major Games anything can happen, and I want to have the self-belief to be able to compete with the best in the world.”
At her side searching for more magic will be Sade McCreath, Marie-Eloise Leclair and Gatineau’s Audrey Leduc. It’s a young Canadian lineup that’s got the women’s 4×100 relay program on the upswing. McCreath is the eldest at 28, Leduc is 25, Madogo is 24 and Leclair is 21.
Canada will race for a medal out of lane three, at 1:30 p.m. Ottawa time.
There is a slight possibility Eliezer Adjibi could compete for the Canadian men’s 4×100 m relay team, which will compete shortly after the women.
While it is likely Canada will put out the same group that ran in the heats (with Adjibi as alternate), there is still a chance he could compete in the final if one of his teammates in unable to run. In particular, Andre De Grasse has been battling a lingering leg injury throughout the Games, in which he didn’t reach the final in either of the men’s 100 m or 200 m.
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