Canadian rugby women win gold at Pan Ams

Canada got the Pan American Games off to a flying start by powering home first in the women’s K-4 500 metres on Saturday to claim the first gold medal of the competition.

Now, their focus turns to next season, moving up the worldwide rankings where they’re currently ninth and, most importantly, preparing for their final opportunity next June to qualify for the 2016 Olympics and join the Canadian women’s team for the sport’s debut in Rio. “I can’t find the words to describe how it feels to win gold, in the Pan Am Games, in Toronto, on home soil, the very first medal”.

The Canadians were spurred on by their captain.

Montreal’s Francis Luna-Grenier earned Canada’s first weightlifting medal of these Games with a bronze in the men’s 69-kilogram event.

“I was really pleased with the fact we were able to rotate, share the minutes and rest up a little but for (Sunday’s) games because it will get a lot tougher”, said Tait.

“We have some big stadiums”, Rafi said.

“That’s what we did and that really lead to our win”.

Erin Huck of the USA, was third, 5:23 off the pace. They train year-round on the sevens game instead of jumping into it from the traditional 15s game at the last minute.

Canada did not look back after that.

After Kristen Thomas sprinted to a solo opening try for the Americans, the home side scored nine without response to run out 55-7 winners. “I lost to her twice before so I was trying to do something different and she caught me again”.

“The fans were great”, said Canada’s Ashley Steacy.

Ten of the 12 Canadian women scored tries on the day as coach John Tait substituted liberally.

“You can expect many more trophies from us and building towards Rio” said Kish. “We don’t just want to be the best at this race, we want to be the best in the world”.

When the Canadian men won the gold medal in 2011, by their own admission, they didn’t actually play that well.

Two of these came courtesy of team victories over Canada, in dressage and women’s artistic gymnastics, while under 57 kilograms judoka Marti Malloy and 10km open water swimming Chip Peterson also finished top of their respective podiums. “And now this dream has finally nearly come true, and I don’t really know how to react about it”.

“It reflects that tenacious spirit that these guys really embody and they reflect”, said Middleton.

Canada’s gold-medal winning performance was a blur on Saturday. – Rob Schumacher-USA TODAY Sports/Reuters picTroy Nyhaug then won the men’s BMX while the hosts also picked up silver in judo and another silver and two bronze from the diving pool to bring their medal total to eight, one ahead of the United States, Mexico and Colombia, who all finished the day on seven medals.