Fans of team Canada cheer from the stands during a women's water polo between Canada and Italy at the Paris La Defense Arena on Aug. 8, 2024.Evgenia Novozhenina/Reuters
The Canadian Olympic Committee is celebrating one of Canada’s best medal totals in Games history, but it’s also facing difficult questions about a pair of scandals that cast a shadow over the performances.
Canada won 27 medals in Paris – nine gold, seven silver and 11 bronze – more than any Summer Olympics since the boycott-plagued 1984 Games 40 years ago in Los Angeles. Canada won 44 medals in 1984, but 14 Eastern Bloc countries didn’t participate, including the Soviet Union and East Germany. Russia has also been largely absent from the Paris Olympics because of sanctions related to its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
“What a journey we’ve been on these 2024 Games,” said Tricia Smith, president of the COC. “And as is the case at every Olympic Games, there have been some highs, some lows, some surprises, a lot of surprises, joy and heartbreak, and we’ve seen it all here in Paris.”
Despite the success, the Canadian team also faced two major scandals in Paris: reports of spying by Canadian soccer officials and questions about why the COC gave, and then withdrew, Games’ accreditation for U.S.-based track coach Rana Reider, who is facing allegations of sexual assault and harassment by three former athletes in three lawsuits filed in Broward County, Fla. Those allegations have not been tested in court and Reider has not been charged with any crimes. Details of the lawsuit emerged last weekend in articles in The Guardian and Times of London newspapers.
“I certainly don’t think that was how any of us wanted to start our Games, but I’m very happy with how we are ending them,” the COC’s chief executive David Shoemaker said.
The spying scandal dominated the opening week of the Olympics and the Canadian women’s team was docked six points in the Olympic tournament by the sport’s governing body, FIFA. Canada’s coach, Bev Priestman, has also been suspended for a year by FIFA. The Canadian team still progressed to the medal round but lost in the quarter-finals to Germany.
Shoemaker said the COC will co-operate with any other potential investigations into the spying reports, including possibly by members of Parliament. “Certainly, if asked to participate by Parliament, or any committee of Parliament, we’ll be happy to collaborate and share what we did,” he said.
While the soccer scandal tarnished the start of the Games for Canada, Shoemaker added, “I can sit here, nearly three weeks later, and feel that the athletes on the field of play have done an enormous amount of good to remedy that situation.”
Shoemaker also defended the COC’s accreditation system and said that Reider was given a specific credential that allowed him to work with certain athletes, notably sprinter Andre De Grasse, who has been coached by the American for years.
The COC gave Reider a “personal coaching credential” at the request of Athletics Canada, Shoemaker explained. As far as the COC understood, Reider was not facing any sanctions and he had served a year-long probation put in place by the U.S. Center for SafeSport, a non-profit organization responsible for preventing emotional and physical abuse of U.S. Olympic athletes.
Athletics Canada learned of allegations against Andre De Grasse’s coach on weekend, CEO says
Reider “didn’t violate any of our rules and was granted, therefore, this limited personal-coach credential that allowed him to be present in training venues and a warm-up area,” Shoemaker said.
Last Sunday, the COC pulled Reider’s credentials after Athletics Canada was told by U.S. track officials that Reider had been the subject of a safety order.
“We learned on, I believe it was Sunday, the fourth of August, while Andre was sprinting, that in fact, [Reider] was subject to a safety order by USA Track and Field and overnight pulled his credential,” Shoemaker said.
He added that the COC performs background checks on its Olympic delegations in the months leading up to the Games.
“We come away from Games always taking a look at what went right and what went wrong, and we’ll certainly revisit this situation and others to understand if there’s something that we need to change,” he said.
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