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Cananda wraps up Pan Am championships in Cochabamba with 15 medal haul

Team Canada leaves Bolivia with 15 medals, new Canadian records and a world record after a extremely successful start of the track season

September 8, 2019
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After Canada started the 2019 Pan American Track Championships with a world record and numerous new national records, the team kept the momentum up concluding the competition with 15 medals in total. The continental championships are an important competition for Canada that’s trying to seal up roster spots for the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics. The success is also important to build momentum leading into the 2019-2020 UCI World Cup season. Apart from the medal haul, Team Canada also set numerous new national records at the velodrome at 2,558 m above sea level.

Kelsey Mitchell got things rolling at the Pan Am championships when she set a new world record in the women’s 200 m sprint with a time of 10.154.

“It felt pretty great to establish a new record,” said Mitchell. “The track is fast here and the air is thin, so I knew the record would be beaten but I didn’t know if I would be the one to do it. I’m pumped about my time but I’m focused on the next race and hoping to make it all the way to the final.”

She would go on to win all her heats and take the gold medal. Things didn’t stop there with the women’s team pursuit setting a national record of 4:13.488 and the men doing the same with a time 3:49.974. Both teams would go on to earn gold medals, automatically qualifying for to the world championships in the process.

In individual events, Kinley Gibson and Aidan Caves won bronze in the scratch race earlier in the week. Lauriane Genest and Mitchell also won a gold medal in the team sprint and set a new national record of 32.232.

That stunning list of results continued to build throughout the competition. Michael Foley won gold in the points race while Jay Lamoureux took home silver in the individual pursuit.

On the fourth day of competition, Georgia Simmerling won gold in the individual pursuit with Annie Foreman-Mackey earning silver. Derek Gee took gold in the omnium.

On the last day of competition, Genest earned gold in the keirin with Mitchell in third while Vincent de Haitre took bronze in the one-kilometre time trial.