Canada Has Swimming 'Dream Team' Ready for Paris 2024

Summary:

• Canada has announced its headline Olympic and Paralympic team of swimmers on Sunday.
• The announcement came at the end of a heated week of trials and world-class performances at the Pan Am Sports Centre.
• Summer McIntosh and Penny Oleksiak headline the Olympic team.

Last week, Toronto’s Pan Am Sports Centre hosted the much-anticipated swimming trials supposed to help Canada cherry-pick its stars for the upcoming Paris 2024 Olympics. 

The sports complex that is co-owned by the City of Toronto and the University of Toronto Scarborough witnessed a series of world-class performances from the Canadian swim team led by coach John Atkinson.

Summer McIntosh and Penny Oleksiak are just a few of the stars named as Olympic nominees for the swim ‘dream team‘ that will represent the country this summer. 

“The Deepest Team” in Swimming Canada’s History

Atkinson, who is also the team’s high-performance director, commented on the list of nominees, describing it as “the deepest team that I’ve taken for Swimming Canada“. 

The coach explained that multiple athletes “have done world-class performances” and they can “all look to go on and improve on that and be better” during the Paris Games.

In Atkinson’s opinion, the Canadian crew that scooped up six medals at the Rio Olympics in 2016 and six medals at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 had “more depth” at last week’s trials. 

Accordingly, the coach expects them to “at least get to that number” of medals in Paris, and then some. 

McIntosh and Oleksiak, the Stars of the Trials  

Eight-time world champion medallist from Toronto, Summer McIntosh, managed to qualify for five individual events at the trials. 

The 17-year-old won the 400-metre freestyle, 200 freestyle, 400 individual medley, where she broke her own world record, 200 butterfly and 200 medley.

McIntosh, who attended the Tokyo Olympics when she was 14, expressed her happiness for qualifying in some of her “top five events” while also expressing excitement for going to Paris where she expects “an amazing meet, not just for me but all of Team Canada“.

Penny Oleksiak, the county’s most decorated Olympian with seven medals, defeated her long string of injuries over the last few years, including a second knee surgery four months ago, and won 100 freestyle on Friday.

She got under the consideration time and just over the qualifying time, which means she will be competing for the 4×100 freestyle relay team.

The 23-year-old who is also a Toronto native also won the 50 freestyle on Sunday but failed to get under the qualifying or consideration time.

The swimmer who won a gold in the 100 free in the Rio Games in 2026 finished ninth in the 200 freestyle.

Countries are allowed to enter up to two athletes per each individual event with June 23 as the deadline to go under the qualifying time at a competition approved by the World Aquatics. 

This means that while Oleksiak can compete in the women’s 4×100-metre freestyle relay in Paris, her participation in the individual 100 freestyle remains uncertain.

The list of swimmers heading to Paris this summer also includes Maggie Mac Neil, the Olympic champion in the women’s 100 butterfly, and Kylie Masse, the four-time Olympic medallist and silver medallist in the women’s 100 backstroke. 

21-year-old Josh Liendo set his second record with a 50.06-second showing on Sunday evening, following up his initial record time of 50.33 seconds earlier that same day.

Montreal’s Ilya Kharun (51.09) of Montreal and Okotoks’ Finlay Knox (51.42) also qualified as they were under the Olympic qualifying time of 51.67 seconds.