@movernie
What a win! What a victory!
The Canadian Men’s Relay Team won gold, a major surprise win to take home the gold medal. The reason why I said “Surprise” was that….entering the final run, the Canadian Team weren’t the favourite as they didn’t dominate in any of the qualifying rounds.
In fact, the Americans were the favourite, but they got disqualified in the race for stepping out of the line. Moreover, the Americans had some really bad baton exchange that slowed them down.
Team Canada wasn’t considered the favourite mainly individually, Aaron Brown, Jerome Blake, Brendon Rodney and Andre de Grasse, all didn’t have great finish or to the podium in their respective individual races. In particular, Andre de Grasse didn’t win a medal in his 200m race coz he said he had reaggravated his hamstring.
But hey, team relay is a team sport, it’s sum of all parts, everything has to go right to win gold. Not only it requires a strong individual effort, but they also need timely and smooth transition of passing the baton among the runners and the Canadian Men’s did just that, overall, they had smooth transitions among each other.
Moreover, each runner were placed in the order of their expertise. Aaron Brown had a great start to the race. Jerome Blake, being Jerome, provided his consistent and reliable fast running. Brendon Rodney expertise in running the bend and of course, Andre de Grasse is good at powering through and knowing how to outrun others to the finish line.
This was a nerve wrecking race as the top 3 finishers were very tight in the race until the last few seconds when Andre was the clear winner to the finish line.
In my opinion, this was one of my favourite races to watch Team Canada wins! I still remember the gold medal last won by Team Canada back in 1996 that includes Legends Donovan Bailey. This is a great example that “Anything is Possible!”. The Americans coming in being arrogant and the favourite but when it counts the most, they falter. That’s why athletes race coz you never know, anything can happen, and anyone can win!
Congratulations to Team Canada! Very proud!
MoVernie FUN FACT: Did you know….
Canada Men’s Relay Team won the following medals?
2016 (Rio, Brazil) – Bronze
2021 (Tokyo, Japan) – Silver
2024 (Paris, France) – Gold
They have collective them all!
