Winter Olympics: Countdown begins for Canada’s best
The 100-days-out mark for the Pyeongchang Games arrives Wednesday. Pending official qualification and assuming that any injuries are kept to a minimum, here’s a list of five Canadian athletes to watch at the 2018 Winter Olympics:
BRADY LEMAN
The ski-cross star just missed the podium at the Sochi Games, settling for a fourth-place finish behind three French skiers in a final loaded with controversy. “Pantsgate” stemmed from allegations that French team staffers changed the shape of their athletes’ ski pants for better aerodynamics. However, appeals from Canada and Slovenia were dismissed. Leman made a late push but went down on the final corner of the course. The Calgary native will be hungry for hardware in Pyeongchang.
KAILLIE HUMPHRIES
The two-time reigning Olympic women’s bobsled champion from Calgary will go for the three-peat in South Korea. She will try to win gold this time with a different brakeman. Humphries teamed with Heather Moyse to win gold in 2010 and 2014. Humphries will likely have Melissa Lotholz or Cynthia Appiah behind her in the sled at the 2018 Games.
KAETLYN OSMOND
The 21-year-old figure skater appears primed for an Olympic breakout. The native of Marystown, N.L., won the women’s singles competition at Skate Canada last week and she picked up silver at the world championship last season. Osmond is considered to be Canada’s best women’s figure skater since Joannie Rochette, who won bronze at the 2010 Vancouver Games. Rochette’s podium appearance was Canada’s first Olympic medal in women’s figure skating since the 1988 Calgary Games.
MARK MCMORRIS
The 23-year-old snowboarder from Regina fought through the pain of a rib injury to win Olympic bronze in Sochi. A big air competition has been added to the Olympic program for 2018 and like slopestyle, it’s right up McMorris’s alley. He has done the double before, winning slopestyle and big air events at the 2012 Winter X Games. McMorris is confident he’ll be ready for Pyeongchang despite suffering several significant injuries in a backcountry crash last March.
DENNY MORRISON
The veteran long-track speed skater has come back from a nasty motorcycle crash in 2015 and a stroke he suffered last year. Morrison, a 32year-old from Fort St. John, B.C., is back in top form and looking to add to his collection of four Olympic medals. Morrison won silver (1,000 metres) and bronze (1,500) in 2014.