Canada’s athletes walk in the opening ceremony in the 2018 Commonwealth Games (Yan Huckendubler/CGC)
The 2018 Commonwealth Games kicked off this week – and some hometown heroes are coming up big.
Joanna Brown trains on the Island full time and brought home bronze in the triathlon. Also earning bronze is Victoria’s hometown hero Jay Lamoureux who, with the donned the red and white with the Canadian men’s track pursuit team.
But, the fight continues for many – the Island’s Maddie Secco and Kathleen Leahy play for the Canada’s women’s field hockey team. The women are sitting third in their pool, but in order to advance to the medal round, the team needs a win next against New Zealand. The game kicks off Saturday night at 6:30 PM PT and you can catch the action streamed through Field Hockey Canada’s website.
Canada’s Women’s field hockey team kick off the 2018 Commonwealth Games (Yan Huckendubler/CGC)
The team is currently ranked 21st in the world. They opened the games as the heavy underdogs against host team Australia, and delivered a gutsy performance against the 5th ranked team in the world. The women took a well fought 1-0 loss, and went on to play Scotland in an intense 0-0 draw leaving them third place in their pool.
Canada’s representation
Canada has 283 athletes competing, 52 from the Island who live or train here full-time.
Medal count
Canada currently sits third in the medal count with 2 golds, 4 silvers and 5 bronzes for a total of 11 medals.
The 2018 Commonwealth Games medal count as of April 6th
For the full medal count breakdown head over to the Gold Coast 2018 commonwealth games website.
History of the Games
The first “friendly games” were were held in Hamilton, Canada in 1930, and since then, have been “bringing together the members of the Commonwealth of Nations in an effort to raise the bar of sport for all humanity and provide a level playing field where athletes compete in a spirit of friendship and fair play,” according to the Commonwealth Games Federation.
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