Katie Vincent of Team Canada reacts after winning the goal medal after the Women’s Canoe Single 200m Final A on day fifteen of the Olympic Games Paris 2024 at Vaires-Sur-Marne Nautical Stadium on Aug. 10, in Paris, France.Charles McQuillan/Getty Images
When she was 14 years old, Katie Vincent had to make a decision about which sport to pursue, and the choice left her in tears.
She’d been canoeing with her older brother, Chris, and the kids next door at a club in Mississauga, and she showed real promise. But she loved skiing. On the slopes she was known as “Kit Kat” and she tried everything from downhill to slalom to Super G.
Her canoe coaches gave her some harsh truths; had she been training harder on the water she would have gone to the world championships. It was time to make a commitment, they said.
“There were a lot of tears and whatnot, but she made the decision to focus on the paddling,” recalled her father, Paul Vincent, who didn’t mind the switch too much since the cost of canoeing – $400 for a paddle that lasts forever and about $2,000 for a used canoe – is a fraction of ski racing.
Seven months later she entered her first major international competition in Rio de Janeiro and came home with three gold medals and two bronze. “So, it was a pretty good start,” her father said.
The medals soon started piling up: at world championships, Pan American championships and a host of other international competitions. Then came the Olympics.
Women’s canoe events were only added to the Olympic program at the Tokyo Games and Vincent took a bronze in the C2 500-metre with Laurence Vincent Lapointe.
On Friday in Paris, she won another bronze in the C2 500-metre this time with Sloan MacKenzie.
On Saturday she paddled the race of her life.
Vincent won the C1 200-metre canoe sprint in a world-record time of 44.12 seconds. Nevin Harrison of the United States finished second in 44.13 and Cuba’s Yarisleidis Cirilo Duboys took bronze with 44.36.
The finish was so close that Vincent and Harrison had to wait a few minutes for officials to announce the winner. “Deep down, I thought I’d won,” Vincent said. “When Canada popped up, I looked over and I saw many Canadian flags waving in the crowd and that was a really special moment, and that made me really excited.”
She spoke later about how far the 200-metre sprint has come in the past decade. Not that long ago, 44 seconds was a dream. On Saturday, five finalists went under 45 seconds.
Canada’s Sophia Jensen, 22, finished sixth in 45.08, her best time yet and is an indication of the strength of Canada’s canoe and kayak program. She, too, marvelled at the quality of the final. “The difference between Katie and me is less than a second. So, it’s pretty incredible being out there with such a strong field of girls,” she said.
After she got her medal on Saturday and stood for the national anthem, Vincent headed off to see her family. There were hugs from a group of friends and family, including Paul and her mother Maryanne McDougald. And then she was embraced by her big brother Chris who couldn’t resist shouting “Kit Kat.”