Ahead of the 2012 London Olympics, the stated hope was that Canada could place among the top 12 medal-winning countries. It didn’t happen. Canadian athletes won 18 medals, tied for 13th in total medals; only trampolinist Rosie MacLennan (pictured) returned home with gold.Moe Doiron/The Globe and Mail
There are many ways to frame Olympic success, but with three weeks until the curtain rises on the Rio Games, Canada's major amateur sport funders have put a mark on their measuring stick: 19 (or more) medals.
The benchmarking exercise has become a tradition in the final preparation stage for the Canadian Olympic Committee and Own the Podium.
Ahead of the 2012 London Olympics, the stated hope was that Canada could place among the top 12 medal-winning countries.
It didn't happen. Canadian athletes won 18 medals, tied for 13th in total medals; only trampolinist Rosie MacLennan returned home with gold.
"The primary goal is to win more medals than we did in London," OTP head Anne Merklinger told a media conference call. "Our ultimate stretch goal is to finish in the top-12."
Given how long it's been since that happened – 1996 in Atlanta – and the fact that many of Canada's brighter prospects are young and aiming for success in 2020 rather than this summer, it could be a long shot. One well-known Olympic forecaster, Gracenote (the former Infostrada), is predicting Canada will wind up with 16 medals.
At least Canada's 315 or so athletes will be able to travel to South America in complete safety – or so claims the COC.
Chris Overholt, the Olympic body's chief executive, said preparations have been undertaken "with an abundance of caution" from both a public health and policing standpoint.
All the athletes and teams with realistic medal hopes have had the opportunity to make site visits.
He added the COC has gone to "unusual lengths" to inform athletes, their families and members of the travelling delegation about the various health risks in Brazil, the Zika virus chief among them.
Overholt said a total of 44 test events have been held at the various Rio venues, involving 17,000 athletes, coaches, event officials and spectators, without a single confirmed case of Zika.
In other words, Team Canada will go where the world's top four male golfers fear to tread.
No Canadian athlete has opted to stay home – although a small number of staffers opted out because of various pre-existing health concerns.
The COC and OTP clearly prefer to focus on the potential for medals, and goal-setting is a key component of high-performance sports. But their medal-prognosticating rankles some athletes and their coaches; one Olympic coach, speaking privately, said athletes already feel enough pressure.
That may be, but OTP has poured $140-million into Olympic and Paralympic sports during the current quadrennial cycle, so results are paramount. And OTP and the COC have put considerable work in improving their return on investment at the margins.
In the current pre-Olympic period, Canadian athletes have registered more top-eight finishes than in the lead-up to London – including 37 top-five finishes at world-level competitions.
It's the result, Merklinger said, of identifying performance gaps after London and filling them with better coaches, "world-leading" team executives and more sharply targeted funding.
A conscious decision was also made after London to step up the resources dedicated to younger athletes who weren't expected to reach their full medal potential until Tokyo in 2020.
Beyond the top-line medal count, this summer constitutes a test for those youngsters.
"We will assess every performance in Rio de Janeiro – top-five, top-eight, and those athletes with potential for 2020 and 2024," Merklinger said.
The Canadian contingent to Rio, according to Overholt, "is larger and deeper than the team we sent to London … we're confident in our potential to finish in the top 12."
Merklinger highlighted the track and field team – which includes world champions Derek Drouin (high jump) and Shawn Barber (pole vault), and medal favourites Andre De Grasse (100 and 200 metres), Melissa Bishop (800 metres) and Brianne Theisen-Eaton (heptathlon) – as the likeliest source of multiple medals.
She also mentioned high expectations in diving, swimming, cycling and women's wrestling.
Canada has also qualified in five team events, matching the national record last achieved in Beijing in 2008. Merklinger said the women's rugby sevens team is perhaps the best-placed to bring home a medal.
Over all, she said, "Canada is ready."