And the bottom fell out

warm up against the Netherlands.

Lots of stuff going on everywhere around these parts but I spent yesterday very focused on our women’s WCBB team. The loss at the hands of the Dutch team was, as expected, met with quite a few tears from our players. It brought the reality of sports to the surface. It is not always success they face but defeat. The word failure is not truly the one to describe the day. They worked hard but at the end the score was not in their favor. Netherlands 78, Canada 60. The game was closer but, as you may know from the sport of basketball, in the last few minutes of a game, the losing team often fouls to get the ball and allows the other team many free throws.

You can look at the stats of the game and see they matched up and shot a similar, if not a little better, percentage than the opponent so what was the deciding factor? Look at the rebounds the Netherlands had on offence: 21. We had 22 defensive rebounds. This means they missed over 40 shots and had a second chance on 21 of them. That was the deciding factor. We had only 6 offensive rebounds.  They shot more often as many were second chances. They were in better position, we didn’t defend as well as we should have and against a strong team like the Dutch, you will pay for this.

Rosalie Lalonde heading up the court

Sports at this level present an interesting situation. These amateur athletes train, travel internationally to meet other teams at small tournaments and more training centralized in Toronto but they have day jobs and families. 2 Players play pro in Germany but most need other income. Some are at the University of Alabama on the varsity WCBB team. So this training is extra to their normal life and it all comes to the surface every 4 years for World Championships and also on a 4 years cycle, the Paralympics. Not like pro athletes where they train all day, play their season, make or fail playoffs go for the sport’s big trophy and it all starts again next year. ON top of that, make tons of money. For these athletes, all the training is focused on 4 years cycles. They had a bad tournament in Beijing and finished 5^th.  Trying “not to repeat” this bad outcome, the team at the London Paralympics fought hard but the team was not as cohesive and self destructed to a bad last game ending them in 6^th! These players have worked hard to get here, came in first at World Championships 2 years ago while ranked 6^th in the world and yesterday, their next goal, exploded. Not even in the final four due to a complicated 3-way tiebreaker for first place (3 teams with a 3-1 record) landing them against the Dutch with the loss making them play for 5^th or 6^th tomorrow again.

They can only fix this result in 4 years and live with this memory during that whole time.

As I said, sports at this level present interesting situations.

So the mood was horrible. Anger. Sadness. Frustration. Regret. Various others. It eventually settled by the evening and they were able to talk again instead of hiding in their shells. This morning, there were smiles and the realization that more work is needed, they can’t hide anymore as we are facing the Chinese in 2 days. Is it coincidental the team from China is who faced the Canadians in London 4 years ago?

As I said at the beginning, there is a lot going on. We had many athletes in the pool last night but, unfortunately, not many medals came our way. Aurélie Rivard swam for her second gold medal of the games. There are still some swimming events for the next few days. We all hope more can be Canadian successes.

Katarina Roxon

The canoe/kayak athletes have been out in the Lagoon and we have 2 in the finals tomorrow.

Our cyclist got back in the saddle at the time trial. As there are time trials in all classifications (C1-5, H1-5, T1-2 then the B classes) and for men and women, it starts at 8 am and will end after 4. Tristan Chernove who already medalled on the track came up with a great ride and a gold medal in the C2 class. Ross Wilson added to his medal at the track with another silver in the C1 class. Charles Moreau who rides a handbike in the H3 class got himself a bronze with 0.22 seconds ahead of 4^th. Shelley Gauthier got bronze in the T1-2 race.

The next big team event starts today for Canada as our rugby team takes to the court. Wheelchair rugby is an exciting sport played by athletes who need at least 3 limbs to be affected. Most are partial quadraplegics but there are many with congenital or traumatic limb conditions as well. Crashing wheelchairs is the name of the game and since we are playing Brazil tonight: better wear ear protection, as it will be a loud crowd!

Wheelchair rugby chair. Tanklike

I just came back from a very relaxed practice with the women WCBB team. Now some time in the clinic and since it is quiet, I ‘ll head to the gym for a little energy expenditure. Tonight the wheelchair basketball teams are all heading to Canada Paralympic House in Barra area. It should be a fun social evening where family and friends of any athlete can come and meet the athletes and hang out. I’ll report on this tomorrow.