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Bronze for Canada’s team pursuit women

Two consecutive Olympic Games bronzes for Canadian squad

August 13, 2016
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Canada took its first cycling medal of the 2016 Rio Summer Olympic Games Saturday with a bronze in the women’s team pursuit on the Rio Olympic Velodrome. Jasmin Glaesser, Allison Beveridge, Georgia Simmerling and Kirsti Lay beat New Zealand on the boards, matching the accomplishment at London 2012. Four years ago the trio of Glaesser, Gillian Carleton and Tara Whitten beat Australia for the bronze.


Canada led immediately, with the Kiwis turning it on in the middle third of the contest. Both teams were down to three riders with a kilometres to go. At the bell Canada was 3-seconds faster.

The team’s time was 4:14:627, beating the Canadian record they had set earlier in the day.

The team pursuit squad’s day started with their first round matchup versus the world record holding Brits. Canada had qualified on Thursday with the fourth fastest time. Laura Brown, the fifth member of Canada’s bronze medal squad, helped the team qualify with a time of 4:19.59. Lay got the call over Laura Brown on Saturday and though the quartet didn’t beat the Brits, it set the day’s third fastest time, a new Canadian record of 4:14:636.


World champions U.S.A. broke the Brits’ WR in Heat 3 while defeating the Australians, but Great Britain promptly reset the fast mark against the Canadians with 4:12:152. It was fitting that the two hottest teams would vie for the gold.

In the gold match, the Americans went out very fast and took the early lead. At the midway mark of 4-km, the Brits were ahead. The USA dropped a rider while the Brits kept their numbers for two more laps. It was, not surprisingly, another WR–4:10.236. Britain has now won three of the four gold medals given out on the track.

Rio’s track day began with women’s keirin first round action. Although Canadians Monique Sullivan and Kate O’Brien didn’t qualify directly, they were given the opportunity to advance via repechage. Neither made it through. The duo finished eighth in the team sprint on Friday.

In one of the early qualifying heats, a Dutch athlete had to make an extraordinary escape from a crash by climbing the track’s outside wall.