Canada’s most adorned male Olympian, Andre De Grasse, has been chosen by the Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) to hold the flag for Crew Canada on the Paris 2024 opening ceremonies on July 26. On Wednesday, the COC introduced that De Grasse will carry the flag alongside girls’s weightlifter Maude Charron. Each are defending Olympic champions of their respective occasions.
Two reigning Olympic champions will carry the Canadian flag into the Opening Ceremony for Paris 2024! https://t.co/w0R2M9Yhzp
— Crew Canada (@TeamCanada) July 24, 2024
De Grasse has by no means carried the Canadian flag at a gap or closing ceremony, and Paris marks the third time he’ll symbolize Canada on the Olympic Video games. He’ll once more be a medal contender within the males’s 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay. Regardless of this being his third Olympics, this will probably be his first time attending the opening ceremony.
When requested if he would do Crew Canada the honour of serving as flag bearer, De Grasse’s response was: “That might be a dream come true for me. I by no means thought that chance would ever come, you understand, due to course being in monitor and subject, we by no means get an opportunity to actually go to the opening ceremony. So I imply, I’m excited simply to even go and now to be the flag bearer for the nation! I’m speechless–I’m making an attempt to get the phrases out.”
The Markham, Ont., native has gained six medals on the final two Olympic Video games (one gold, two silver, and three bronze). He’s the one sprinter on the earth to win a person medal within the males’s 100m on the final two Olympic Video games. His 200m gold medal end at Tokyo 2020 was the primary Canadian Olympic gold on the monitor in 25 years and the primary within the 200m in 93 years.
The 29-year-old has been a constant podium finisher at main championships, profitable a medal in each Olympic and World Championship last he competed in from 2015 till the 2023 World Championships. He completed sixth within the males’s 200m world championship last in Budapest.
De Grasse has returned to prime kind this season, profitable his first nationwide 100m title since 2017 on the 2024 Canadian Olympic Trials in Montreal in late June. Two weeks later, he ran his quickest 200m time of the yr on the Gyulai István Memorial Continental Tour meet in Hungary, clocking his first sub-20-second time for the reason that Diamond League last in September 2023.
He’ll start his Paris 2024 marketing campaign within the males’s 100m heats on Saturday, Aug. 3, with the boys’s 200m and 4x100m occasions coming later within the week.
