BANNER DAY FOR OLYMPIC DARLINGS
Ice dance pair Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir say being named Team Canada’s flagbearers in Pyeongchang is greatest honour of their career,
They’ve competed together since they were children and they’ve won Olympic gold and silver, world championships and countless Canadian titles in ice dancing.
Now, Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir have been handed a new honour — one that can’t be won, only given — and they say it’s the greatest of their career.
Virtue and Moir were named Canada’s flag-bearers for the upcoming Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
“We see this as probably the biggest honour of our career and, luckily, we get to do it before the Olympics to kind of kick them off and lead an extremely talented team into the Games,” Moir said at Tuesday’s announcement in Ottawa.
The ice dancers won gold before a home crowd at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics and followed that up with silver medals in ice dance and the team event at the 2014 Games in Sochi.
They are the first duo to carry Canada’s flag into the opening ceremony, and they hope to follow up that history-making moment by winning another gold medal in their event.
Virtue, 28, from London, Ont., and Moir, 30, from nearby Ilderton, Ont., stepped away from competition for two years after the last Winter Games but returned as strong as ever. They produced one of their best seasons in 2016-17, going undefeated on the way to their third world title.
“We’re trying to savour every moment of this,” Virtue said. “We’ve spent so many years making sacrifices and putting in all the hard work, and we have to remind ourselves that it’s moments like this that make it all worth it.” The Canadian Olympic Committee made the announcement in the foyer of the House of Commons, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau handed Virtue and Moir the Canadian flag.
“Knowing that we have the Prime Minister, his office and the whole country behind us, that means the world to us and we feel that support every time we take the ice. We’re so lucky to come from a country like Canada that is knowledgeable about sport and supportive to their athletes,” Virtue said.
Hockey star Hayley Wickenheiser carried the flag in 2014 in Sochi, and trampoline champion Rosie MacLennan had the honour at the Rio Summer Games in 2016.
There was a time when some athletes shied away from that honour, fearing that it came with some sort of curse on performance. Wickenheiser and MacLennan both defended Olympic gold medals after carrying the flag and “crushed” the curse, Moir said.
“It does add some pressure, but we like that. We always say that we see that pressure as more support because we put as much pressure on ourselves as we can,” he said.
Canada’s team of some 230 athletes will march into the Pyeongchang Olympic Stadium on Feb. 9.
“Team Canada across the board is something fierce, and it’s so thrilling to be part of that,” Virtue said. “We might be carrying the flag, but we really are marching in as Canada.”