Rosie rises to the occasion
Athlete defends Olympic gold
Rosie MacLennan was in a dark place and she wasn’t fully able to see the light until five months ago.
Today, she’s a shining star of Canadian sports, a gold medallist in a second straight Olympics after capturing the women’s trampoline title Friday at the Rio Olympic Arena.
The 27-year-old from King City, Ont., is the first Canadian to win gold in an event in back-to-back Summer Games and is a picture of perseverance after she was forced to overcome concussion symptoms just to make it back to the Olympics.
“It feels incredible,” MacLennan said. “I don’t know how it compares to last time, but I couldn’t be more excited or more proud to stand on top of the podium again.
“There was a lot of time where I didn’t know if I’d get to the world championships, which was our qualification. I didn’t know how it would affect my training. There was a lot of uncertainty, but in those moments, I had an incredible group of people around me, supporting me, cheering me on, giving me strength.”
MacLennan finished third in the qualifying round, which meant there were two competitors still to come after she put up a score of 56.465 in her final routine.
However, Li Dan of China and Tatsiana Piatrenia of Belarus were not able to beat her score and that meant the gold medal was MacLennan’s once again. Bryony Page of England, who went second in the final, took the silver medal and Li won bronze.
“I held back. I did my easy routine,” MacLennan said. “I was a lot more confident in it. The other one was a little shaky and we knew it would be a bit of a gamble, and the Olympics isn’t a time to gamble.”
As recently as March, MacLennan was still feeling the effects of a concussion that was sustained in competition and exacerbated when she was hit in the head by a car door. She said her eyes were still shaking and she was having trouble spotting the trampoline.
“I was afraid of getting lost in skills,” MacLennan said. “That fear and that uncertainly took a long time to get back. It was a reminder of how much I really do love the sport, because if I didn’t, I would have given up.”