10 Canadian athletes to watch at Paris 2024
As the Paris Olympics inch closer, Team Canada is ready to hit the ground running. Here are 10 athletes you can't miss, including past Olympic heroes and soon-to-be household names.
Summer McIntosh, swimming
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It's Summertime. After just missing out on the Olympic podium in 400m freestyle and 4x200m relay in Tokyo, the 17-year-old phenom has become one of the most decorated Canadian swimmers. She became the first Canadian to win four career gold medals at the World Aquatic Championships and the first Canadian to win two golds in a single World Aquatic Championship. During the Canadian Olympic trials to qualify for Paris, she broke world record times in 400m freestyle and 400m individual medley, making her the first swimmer, man or woman, to hold both records consecutively. McIntosh is also the youngest Canadian world champion in history, winning her first title at 14.
Canada is projected by Nielsen to win 21 medals in Paris. Don't be surprised if McIntosh grabs a gold one.
Ethan Katzberg, hammer throw
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Katzberg is peaking at the right time. At 21, the Nanaimo, British Columbia, native became the youngest hammer throw world champion ever at the 2023 World Championships in Hungary and the first Canadian ever to win the event. The now 22-year-old is also the reigning gold medalist of the 2023 Pan American Games.
Katzberg blew away the competition at the Canadian Olympic trials in June, setting a championship record of 82.60 meters to book his trip to Paris. The gold-medal favorite set a personal best distance of 84.38 meters in April, a Canadian record and the longest distance thrown by any athlete since 2008. Katzberg will be the first Canadian man to compete in the hammer throw since the 2008 Beijing Games.
Katie Vincent, canoe
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Twelve weeks before the 2023 World Championships, Vincent broke her arm in a bike accident, sidelining her for four weeks. She came back stronger than ever, winning gold medals for women's C-1 500m, mixed C-2 500m, and women's C-1 5000m in four hours and claimed the bronze in C-2 500m with partner Sloan MacKenzie to receive an Olympic berth.
The Olympics first included women's canoe events in Tokyo, and Vincent took advantage of the opportunity. Finishing eighth in the women's C-1 200m finals, she took home the bronze in C-2 500m with partner Laurence Vincent Lapointe. Now, just two months after winning gold in C-1 200m at the Canoe Sprint World Cup in Hungary, Vincent is ready to add an Olympic gold medal to her hardware.
Marco Arop, track and field
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After coming from Sudan to Canada as a child and picking up running at 18, Arop's seven-year journey in 800 meters has skyrocketed.
Arop won back-to-back golds in the 800-meter race in the 2022 and 2023 Canadian Championships and was named Team Canada's captain for the 2023 edition. Ranked the best in the world, he captured gold and became the only Canadian man to win the 800 meters at the Worlds and the first Canadian man since Donovan Bailey in 1995 to claim an individual gold on track.
The 25-year-old currently holds the 800m Canadian record and secured his spot at the Canadian Olympic trials with a time of 1.43.71 minutes, more than half a second better than his gold medal-winning performance at the 2023 Worlds.
Phil Wizard, breaking
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Breaking is making its debut in Paris and one B-Boy stands above the rest: Vancouver's Philip Kim, also known as Phil Wizard.
The 27-year-old has been breaking since he was 12 and dropped out of university after a semester to commit to the sport full-time. Wizard became the first Canadian to win the Undisputed World Series in 2019 and won gold at the WDSF World Championship. His 2023 season proved even more successful: The B-Boy won three major tournaments, including the Pan American Games, where he was named Canada's flagbearer in the closing ceremonies.
Wizard's mindset - "think like an artist, train like an athlete" - has helped solidify him as one of the most creative and dominant B-Boys on the scene.
Andre De Grasse, track and field
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The eighth-fastest man in 200m history hopes to clinch his second straight Olympic gold medal.
De Grasse broke onto the international scene after his "bromance" with Usain Bolt in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics and is one of Canada's most consistent track and field medalists. He's won six medals across both the Rio and Tokyo Olympics, including a gold in the 200m.
Although he's suffered his fair share of injuries, De Grasse knows how to rise to the occasion. The Markham, Ont. native is Canada's second-most decorated Olympian, and he's medalled in every Olympic event he's competed in, including relay. The three-time Olympian will have no doubts that he can continue that streak in Paris.
Christopher Morales Williams, track and field
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In 2020, when he was in grade 10, Morales Williams wrote himself a reminder for January 2024 to qualify for the Paris Olympics. Since then, the University of Georgia sophomore set the world indoor 400-meter record of 44.39 seconds and later became the first Canadian to win an NCAA title in the indoor 400 meters. He also set a national outdoor record of 44.05 seconds at the SEC outdoor championship - which would have notched him a silver medal at Tokyo 2020 - and subsequently won the NCAA outdoor 400-meter title.
While he's had a long collegiate season, Morales Williams has taken the steps to go pro, including signing a deal with Adidas the night he qualified for Paris. The 19-year-old will be Canada's first 400-meter runner at the Olympics since the 2012 Games in London.
Maude Charron, weightlifting
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The 31-year-old Charron previously won gold in Tokyo for 64-kilogram weightlifting, becoming the second Canadian ever to win an Olympic weightlifting gold. With that discipline removed from Paris, she moved down a weight class to the 59-kilogram category.
Her efforts have proven successful so far. In April, Charron set a Canadian record of 236 kilograms to win bronze at the International Weightlifting Federation World Cup. She previously won gold at the 2022 Commonwealth Games and the 2023 Pan American Championships.
Melissa Humana-Paredes and Brandie Wilkerson, beach volleyball
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Just over a year before hitting the sand in Paris, Humana-Paredes and Wilkerson returned to their York University roots.
Both women competed at the Toronto-based university from 2010 to 2014 before going their separate ways. After falling short in the Tokyo Olympic quarterfinals with their respective partners, Humana-Paredes, the 2019 world champion, and Wilkerson, the 2022 world silver medallist, teamed up and debuted as a duo in February 2023.
The result is one of the most promising partnerships in the sport: They won the 2023 Beach Pro Tour Elite 16 in Montreal and claimed silver at the 2024 Ostrava Elite 16. Ranked fourth in the world, Humana-Paredes and Wilkerson are chasing even more accolades as they compete in front of the Eiffel Tower.
Women's 3x3 basketball
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Even on a team made up of Olympians, it's been a Cinderella story for the women's 3x3 basketball team.
Twins Katherine and Michelle Plouffe, alongside teammate Paige Crozon, have all competed in the Olympics as far back as London 2012. When 3x3 was added to the 2020 Games, the trio, alongside Kacie Bosch, formed a self-funded squad in the summer of 2019. While they missed out on qualifying for Tokyo, the quartet has since climbed the rankings to fifth in the world.
The team won back-to-back FIBA Women's 3x3 Series titles in 2022 and 2023, holding an 88.6 win percentage. The Canadians are ranked as the top three individual women in the sport, with Katherine Plouffe claiming the top spot. After defeating Hungary in a must-win game to qualify for Paris in May, the quartet will play 23rd-ranked Australia in their Olympic debut.