Summer McIntosh competes in the women’s 400-metre freestyle event at the Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre on Tuesday. McIntosh set the world record during the race with a time of 3:56.08, supplanting Australia’s Ariarne Titmus. (Michael P. Hall/Swimming Canada – image credit)
Summer McIntosh is now the world record holder in the 400-metre freestyle event.
The 16-year-old phenom electrified the hometown crowd with another memorable performance on Tuesday night at the Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre on opening night of the national trials.
With her parents, Jill and Greg McIntosh in the crowd, Summer stopped the clock in a time of 3:56.08, breaking the world record held by Ariarne Titmus of Australia.
It’s her first world record — she holds many world junior and national records.
McIntosh was overrun with emotion after the race as she looked up at her parents cheering in the stands.
WATCH | How Summer McIntosh’s world record swim looked from poolside:
The normally composed and reserved teen broke down in tears.
“I’m not a crier,” she told CBC Sports after the race.
“It’s absolutely incredible. I’m not an emotional person. But I was hit with so much emotion. Pure euphoria right now. I’m just so grateful for everyone who got me to this point.”
WATCH | McIntosh sets women’s 400m freestyle world record:
McIntosh fought back tears as she described the moment.
“Over the past few years I’ve put my life into this. To be the best I can be. To achieve something like this, it was very unexpected. It was never in my dreams to do this tonight or even a few years ago. This just blows my mind.”
Summer’s head coach Brent Arckey, who travelled from Sarasota, Fla., for the event was equally emotional after the swim.
“I’m not really sure what to say right now. I’m trying to hold it all in. But celebrating her. This is a special thing,” he said.
“I’ve seen her do some really special stuff in practice. I’m just super proud of her. She’s one of the best racers I’ve ever seen.”
Mother Jill’s valuable experience
Jill, who competed in swimming at the 1984 Olympics for Canada, has valuable experience to lean on to help guide her daughter.
She was bursting with pride as she watched Summer touch the wall on Tuesday night at trials.
“I’m so proud of Summer and the person she is, foremost. I just hope she’s happy with her races here this week,” Jill said.
“She loves this facility. It’s all learning at this point heading into the worlds this summer and the Paris Olympics. This is a stepping stone.”
Michael P. Hall/Swimming Canada
Greg talked about how nice it is to be able to drive to the pool to watch his daughter — something that doesn’t happen all that often these days.
“I know she’s training in Florida but she will always be Canadian and we are so proud of her,” he said.
Arckey says each meet from here until the Paris 2024 Olympics is a chance to tinker with things and ultimately get better.
“I don’t fully understand what she means to Canada because I’m not Canadian. I don’t live here, but I’ve got a pretty good idea of what she means to the country,” Arckey said.
“The world championships this summer is the first big test. And we’re going to try to do right by Canada.”
Summer’s meteoric rise doesn’t seem to be slowing down. Her intensity is realized through an unmistakable stoicism despite what’s happening behind her focused face.
Thriving in, out of the pool
McIntosh is thriving, both in swimming and in life, and is loving being in Florida with her club team.
At the place they call the Shark Tank, home of the Sarasota Sharks club, there are three outdoor 25m pools. All 29 lanes spread across the three pools are constantly churned up by legs and arms creating a cacophony of splashing.
Upwards of 60 to 70 swimmers are in the pool during morning practices, including Summer, who is there two times each day of the week.
For as intense and focused as Summer is each training session, she’s also having fun. With a group of swimmers her age with the same goals and dreams as her in the pool, the teen from Canada says she’s right where she wants to be.
“There’s a bunch of girls and guys down here that I’ve started to get really close to and get to know really well, and they’re also going to be travelling on the world stage and that’s really exciting for them and I’m very proud of all of them and what they’ve accomplished so far,” Summer said.
“Together as a group, we’ve really grown and continued to improve our swimming, which is obviously the main goal, but also having fun while doing so.”
‘You have to have fun’
It’s something Jill feels is important.
She doesn’t want her daughter to be so singularly focused on swimming that she forgets to be a kid sometimes.
“I think as parents Greg and I want to make sure the kids are having fun. You have to have fun. No matter how old you are, have fun through your whole career,” Jill said.
“And you have to celebrate the steps along the way.”
In between swimming sessions in Florida, Summer squeezes in school and strength and conditioning sessions.
About ten minutes away from the Shark Tank, Summer works out at the Positive Sports Lab with director Jason Riley. He’s trained NFL and MLB players as well as Olympic gold medallists.
Inside the space there is top-of-the-line equipment at every turn.
Summer can easily do three sets of pushups with a 20-kilogram weight on her back before picking up a medicine ball.
“Doing that is not something you see every day from someone her age. She does not mess around. She’s extremely dedicated to her craft and has the mindset you see in a lot of world-class athletes,” Riley says.
“Summer is a special athlete. She has god-given talent and this unique work ethic and discipline. The sky’s the limit for her.”
What becomes evident very quickly is how much the team around Summer is doing everything it can to make sure she stays in a healthy mental and physical mindset.
She has the experience of her mom’s career to lean on. She has a coach in Arckey who unequivocally respects what Summer’s trying to achieve.
“I have such amazing people surrounding me with family, friends and all the coaches, and I’m so grateful for that and I honestly could not be having any more fun than this,” Summer says.
Other notable results
Eric Brown, 20, of Pointe-Claire, Que., had the unenviable task of following up McIntosh’s stunning performance, swimming to gold in the men’s 400m free finals with a time of 3:50.81.
Also taking home a gold medal in the men’s competition was James Leroux in the 100m breaststroke (Para) with a time of 1:10.97.
First-place finishers in the women’s events were Niki Ens in the 50m breaststroke (Para) with a time of 1:43.32, and Tess Routliffe clocking in at 1:34.68 in the 100m breaststroke.
GUADALAJARA, Mexico – Canada’s Marina Stakusic fell 6-4, 6-3 to Poland’s Magdalena Frech in the quarterfinals of the Guadalajara Open tennis tournament on Friday.
The 19-year-old from Mississauga, Ont., won 61 per cent of her first-serve points and broke on just one of her six opportunities.
Stakusic had upset top-seeded Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (0) on Thursday night to advance.
In the opening round, Stakusic defeated Slovakia’s Anna Karolína Schmiedlová 6-2, 6-4 on Tuesday.
The fifth-seeded Frech won 62 per cent of her first-serve points and converted on three of her nine break point opportunities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
TORONTO – Alejandro Kirk’s long single with the bases loaded provided the Toronto Blue Jays with a walk-off 4-3 win in the 11th inning of their series opener against the St. Louis Cardinals on Friday.
With the Cardinals outfield in, Kirk drove a shot off the base of the left-field wall to give the Blue Jays (70-78) their fourth win in 11 outings and halt the Cardinals’ (74-73) two-game win streak before 30,380 at Rogers Centre.
Kirk enjoyed a two-hit, two-RBI outing.
Erik Swanson (2-2) pitched a perfect 11th inning for the win, while Cardinals reliever Ryan Fernandez (1-5) took the loss.
Blue Jays starter Kevin Gausman enjoyed a seven-inning, 104-pitch outing. He surrendered his two runs on nine hits and two walks and fanned only two Cardinals.
He gave way to reliever Genesis Cabrera, who gave up a one-out homer to Thomas Saggese, his first in 2024, that tied the game in the eighth.
The Cardinals started swiftly with four straight singles to open the game. But they exited the first inning with only two runs on an RBI single to centre from Nolan Arendao and a fielder’s choice from Saggese.
Gausman required 28 pitches to escape the first inning but settled down to allow his teammates to snatch the lead in the fourth.
He also deftly pitched out of threats from the visitors in the fifth, sixth and seventh thanks to some solid defence, including Will Wagner’s diving stop, which led to a double play to end the fifth inning.
George Springer led off with a walk and stole second base. He advanced to third on Nathan Lukes’s single and scored when Vladimir Guerrero Jr. knocked in his 95th run with a double off the left-field wall.
Lukes scored on a sacrifice fly to left field from Spencer Horwitz. Guerrero touched home on Kirk’s two-out single to right.
In the ninth, Guerrero made a critical diving catch on an Arenado grounder to throw out the Cardinals’ infielder, with reliever Tommy Nance covering first. The defensive gem ended the inning with a runner on second base.
St. Louis starter Erick Fedde faced the minimum night batters in the first three innings thanks to a pair of double plays. He lasted five innings, giving up three runs on six hits and a walk with three strikeouts.
ON DECK
Toronto ace Jose Berrios (15-9) will start the second of the three-game series on Saturday. He has a six-game win streak.
The Cardinals will counter with righty Kyle Gibson (8-6).
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
CALGARY – Mired in their first four-game losing skid in 20 years, the Calgary Stampeders are going back to Jake Maier at quarterback on Saturday after he was benched for a game.
It won’t be an easy assignment.
Visiting McMahon Stadium are the Eastern Conference-leading Montreal Alouettes (10-2) who own the CFL’s best record. The Stampeders (4-8) have fallen to last in the Western Conference.
“Six games is plenty of time, but also it is just six games,” said Maier. “We’ve got to be able to get on the right track.”
Calgary is in danger of missing the playoffs for the first time since 2004.
“I do still believe in this team,” said Stampeders’ head coach and general manager Dave Dickenson. “I want to see improvement, though. I want to see guys on a weekly basis elevating their game, and we haven’t been doing that.”
Maier is one of the guys under the microscope. Two weeks ago, the second-year starter threw four interceptions in a 35-20 home loss to the Edmonton Elks.
After his replacement, rookie Logan Bonner, threw five picks in last week’s 37-16 loss to the Elks in Edmonton, the football is back in Maier’s hands.
“Any time you fail or something doesn’t go your way in life, does it stink in the moment? Yeah. But then the days go on and you learn things about yourself and you learn how to prepare a little bit better,” said Maier. “It makes you mentally tougher.”
Dickenson wants to see his quarterback making better decisions with the football.
“Things are going to happen, interceptions will happen, but try to take calculated risks, rather than just putting the ball up there and hoping that we catch it,” said Dickenson.
A former quarterback himself, he knows the importance of that vital position.
“You cannot win without good quarterback play,” Dickenson said. “You’ve got to be able to make some plays — off-schedule plays, move-around plays, plays that break down, plays that aren’t designed perfectly, but somehow you found the right guy, and then those big throws where you’re taking that hit.”
But it’s going to take a team effort, and that includes the club’s receiving corp.
“We always have to band together because we need everything to go right for our receivers to get the ball,” said Nik Lewis, the Stampeders’ receivers coach. “The running back has to pick up the blitz, the o-line has to block, the quarterback has to make the right reads, and then give us a catchable ball.”
Lewis brings a unique perspective to this season’s frustrations as he was a 22-year-old rookie in Calgary in 2004 when the Stamps went 4-14 under coach Matt Dunigan. They turned it around the next season and haven’t missed the playoffs since.”
“Thinking back and just looking at it, there’s just got to be an ultimate belief that you can get it done. Look at Montreal, they were 6-7 last year and they’ve gone 18-2 since then,” said Lewis.
Montreal is also looking to rebound from a 37-23 loss to the B.C. Lions last week. But for head coach Jason Maas, he says his team’s mindset doesn’t change, regardless of what happened the previous week.
“Last year when we went through a four-game losing streak, you couldn’t tell if we were on a four-game winning streak or a four-game losing streak by the way the guys were in the building, the way we prepared, the type of work ethic we have,” said Maas. “All our standards are set, so that’s all we focus on.”
While they may have already clinched a playoff spot, Alouettes’ quarterback Cody Fajardo says this closing stretch remains critical because they want to finish the season strong, just like last year when they won their final five regular-season games before ultimately winning the Grey Cup.
“It doesn’t matter about what you do at the beginning of the year,” said Fajardo. “All that matters is how you end the year and how well you’re playing going into the playoffs so that’s what these games are about.”
The Alouettes’ are kicking off a three-game road stretch, one Fajardo looks forward to.
“You understand what kind of team you have when you play on the road because it’s us versus the world mentality and you can feel everybody against you,” said Fajardo. “Plus, I always tend to find more joy in silencing thousands of people than bringing thousands of people to their feet.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
