Sullivan harbours medal expectations at Olympics
Calgary cyclist turned it up a notch for three golds at 2015 Pan Am Games
Monique Sullivan doesn’t want to say that her preparations for the 2016 Rio Olympics have been better than her lead-up to the 2012 Games in London. They were just different. Or maybe they were better. But mostly different. Four years ago in London, she was the lone female sprinter on the Canadian track cycling team and wound up finishing sixth in the women’s keirin.
It was a huge result for the Calgarian, who was part of a Canadian team that was based out of Los Angeles and was splitting time on the track with the U.S. squad. Times have changed. Today, the Canadians train in a state-of-the-art cycling facility in Milton, Ont., a legacy of last year’s Pan American Games.
“It is pretty much unrecognizable, but the last time leading up to London was special in its own way,” Sullivan said.
“The whole thing is a lot more sustainable (now), I love being in Canada, so to have your own home, it does make a difference.
“We were training in an American facility last time, we were lucky that we even got the track time we needed to prepare.”
Another difference between London and Rio is the expectations for Sullivan.
The 27-year-old was one of Canada’s most decorated athletes at last year’s Pan Am Games, as she swept the sprint events at the velodrome
The whole thing is a lot more sustainable (now) ... We were training in an American facility last time, we were lucky that we even got the track time we needed.
in Milton and finished with three gold medals.
She followed that up with her first career medal on the World Cup circuit, finishing third in the keirin in Cambridge, New Zealand.
“I feel a little bit more pressure this time, so I’m feeling quite nervous, to be honest,” said Sullivan, who grew up in Calgary’s University Heights neighbourhood.
“The legs are starting to come around, so it’s really fun to just go fast and feel that speed.”
“The team has actually been really nice and they’re sort of trying to lessen the pressure a little bit that I put on myself, but in the last year, there’s been a couple performances in which I rode better than I ever have before, so now I have proof that I really could do something (in Rio) and now I’m hoping I can do it on the day that counts. But I have to let that go because it’s distracting me from the tasks that I have to do every day.”
Sullivan will have three chances to bring home medals over the coming weeks, as she’ll compete in the women’s cycling sprint on Aug. 14, the women’s team sprint on Aug. 12 and the women’s keirin on Aug. 13.
There’s more than just medals at stake for the Canadian cycling team, too, as they found out in London when the women’s pursuit team brought home a bronze medal and secured pivotal funding.
As the cycling program continues to grow and evolve, that funding — along with the new facility in Ontario — will be pivotal to its sustained success.
“Sport is all about habit, it’s about doing the same things every day and getting better day-in and dayout and you need a space to do that. We finally have a space,” said Sullivan, who holds a mechanical engineering degree from the University of Calgary.