Day 1: What Team Canada did at Paris 2024
That’s a wrap on Day 1 of Paris 2024 and Team Canada is off to a strong start!
Here’s everything you need to know:
Paris 2024 Competition Schedule
Swimming
Summer McIntosh earned Canada’s first medal of Paris 2024, taking silver in the women’s 400m freestyle. She finished in 3:58.37 to place 0.88 behind Australian Ariarne Titmus.
READ: Summer McIntosh wins silver for Canada’s first medal of Paris 2024
There were two other finals featuring Canadians on the opening night in the pool. Less than an hour after her individual race and just five minutes after her medal ceremony, McIntosh was part of the fourth-place finish (3:32.99) in the women’s 4x100m freestyle relay with Maggie Mac Neil, Taylor Ruck, and Penny Oleksiak.
In the men’s 4x100m freestyle relay just after, Josh Liendo, Yuri Kisil, Finlay Knox, and Javier Acevedo placed sixth in 3:12.18.
Saturday night also featured the semifinals of the women’s 100m butterfly. Reigning Olympic champion Mac Neil advanced to the final tied for the fourth-fastest time. Rebecca Smith had competed in the morning heats but did not advance to the semis.
Fencing
It was a day of upsets for a couple of Team Canada fencers. The big one was in the men’s individual sabre. Fares Arfa defeated three-time defending Olympic champion Aron Szilagyi (Hungary) 15-8 in his opening bout in the Table of 32. He then took down one of the home favourites, Bolade Apithy, 15-8 in front of a loud partisan French crowd at the Grand Palais in the Table of 16.
But Arfa’s run came to an end in the quarterfinals, as third seed Oh Sanguk of South Korea got the 15-13 victory. With his eighth-place finish, Arfa earned Canada’s best ever Olympic result in any men’s individual fencing event.
That had come after Ruien (Angel) Xiao began her day in women’s individual epee with an upset of eighth-seed Nathalie Moellhausen of Brazil, getting the 15-11 win. Xiao, who was the youngest athlete in the field at age 16, took down the second-oldest competitor, aged 38, who is also a former world champion. In the Round of 16, Xiao pushed Ukraine’s Olena Kryvytska into overtime, but ended up losing by one point, 15-14.
Canada’s other two entries in the men’s individual sabre, François Cauchon and Shaul Gordon, were both eliminated in their first bouts. Cauchon dropped his Table of 64 match 15-13 to Argentina’a Pascual Maria di Tella, while Gordon fell 15-10 to Italy’s Luigi Samele in the Table of 32.
Artistic Gymnastics
Team Canada’s René Cournoyer, Zachary Clay, Félix Dolci, William Émard and Samuel Zakutney kicked off their competition with the qualification round for men’s artistic gymnastics. The team finished the qualifying session with a cumulative score of 247.794, which was good enough for eighth place and a spot in the team event final. Advancing to that final had been their primary goal coming into the Games.
Dolci was the team’s top scorer on high bar, floor exercise, vault and parallel bars. He advanced to the all-around final with a total of 81.498. Cournoyer, who scored 80.798, will join him in that all-around final.
Basketball
In their first appearance at the Olympic Games in 24 years, the men’s basketball team opened with an 86-79 win against Greece.
RJ Barrett and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander led the way for Canada offensively. Barrett opened the scoring for Canada at the very beginning of the game with a lay-up, and his breakaway dunk in the closing seconds sealed Canada’s first win at Paris 2024.
Canada led by as much 16, but Greece chipped away at the lead time and time again, bringing the lead down to two with 1:04 remaining in the fourth quarter. A very difficult floater from Gilgeous-Alexander with 42 seconds remaining proved to be the decisive bucket.
Canada will now look ahead to their matchup with Australia on Tuesday. The Aussies upset Spain earlier in the day by a score of 92-80, and sit atop Group A by way of point differential.
Canoe/Kayak Slalom
Alex Baldoni and Lois Betteridge have both advanced to the semifinals of their first events at Paris 2024. Baldoni placed 15th in the men’s C-1 heats while Betteridge was 22nd in the women’s K-1 heats. The semifinals and final of her event will take place on Sunday while Baldoni will be back on the whitewater on Monday.
Road Cycling
Olivia Baril and Derek Gee raced through the streets of Paris in the women’s and men’s individual time trials in road cycling. The 32.4km course started at Les Invalides and finished at the Pont Alexandre III. Athletes had to deal with very wet conditions, leaving the roads slippery.
Baril finished 20th overall in the women’s event, finishing with a time of 43:03.58, which was 3 minutes 25.34 seconds behind the winner, Australia’s Grace Brown.
Gee posted a time of 38:28.17, also good for 20th overall. He was 2 minutes 16.01 seconds back from the winner, Belgian’s Remco Evenepoel, who is fresh off a third place finish at the Tour de France.
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Information Hub
Badminton
Adam Dong and Nyl Yakura kicked things off for Team Canada on Day 1 with a group stage match in men’s doubles. They dropped the match 2-0 (21-5, 21-12) to China’s Liang Wei Keng and Wang Chang, the number one ranked team in the world. Dong and Yakura will play again on Day 2.
Equestrian
Team Canada started the equestrian events with the dressage portion of individual and team eventing. As a team, Jessica Phoenix (Freedom GS), Karl Slezak (Hot Bobo) and Michael Winter (El Mundo) sit in 14th place at the end of Day 1. Individually, Winter leads Team Canada in 42nd place, followed by Phoenix in 43rd and Slezak in 46th. The next portion of eventing will take place on Day 2, with individual and team cross country competition beginning at 10:30 a.m. local time, 4:30 a.m EST.
Beach Volleyball
The relatively new pairing of Heather Bansley and Sophie Bukovec had a challenging start to their first Games as a team. Up against the No. 2 world-ranked American pair of Kristen Nuss and Taryn Kloth, the Canadians fell in two sets (17-21, 14-21).
Bansley is in her third Olympics, having finished fifth twice before (with Sarah Pavan at Rio 2016, and with Brandie Wilkerson at Tokyo 2020). She had turned to coaching after Tokyo, but came out of retirement to team with Bukovec, a first-time Olympian, in July 2023.
The Canadians have two matches left in Pool B of the preliminary phase (Day 3 vs. China, Day 6 vs. Australia).
Shooting
Michele Esercitato finished 17th out of 33 in the men’s 10m air pistol qualification. Only the top eight shooters are moving to the final. The next Canadian shooter to step into action will be Tye Ikeda in the men’s 10m air rifle qualification on Day 2.
Tennis
Rain wiped out most of the matches scheduled for Day 1, except those on covered courts. That meant that Bianca Andreescu, Félix Auger-Aliassime, Leylah Annie Fernandez, and Gaby Dabrowski will have to wait to play their first round matches.
Skateboarding
Though the men’s street event was initially on the schedule, the competition had to be postponed to Day 3 on July 29 because of rain.
