Canada's Camryn Rogers advances to Olympic women's hammer throw final
Fellow Canadians Leduc, Morales Williams reach semis in women's 200m, men's 400m
It took only two rounds for Canada's Camryn Rogers to automatically advance to Tuesday's final in the Olympic women's hammer throw.
The native of Richmond, B.C., met the 73.00 qualifying standard with a throw of 74.69 on a sunny Sunday in France.
"It was definitely a we gotta to get to the finals kind of throw," a smiling Rogers told Devin Heroux of CBC Sports.
That final is scheduled for Tuesday at 1:57 p.m. ET.
Canada has never won an Olympic gold medal in a throwing event and it's been more than 100 years since Canada reached the hammer throw podium at the Games, when Duncan Gillis collected silver in 1912.
In 2022, Rogers was the first Canadian woman to capture a world championship medal with silver in Eugene, Ore.
WATCH | Rogers advances to Tuesday hammer throw final:
Three years ago at the Tokyo Olympics, a then-22-year-old Rogers was the youngest competitor in the women's hammer throw and placed fifth at a time when she "felt so young and so fresh to the scene.'
"To be [back at the Olympics] three years later with a bit more experience and a lot more throws," she said, "I'm super excited to get to the final and show what [me and my coach] have been working on."
In Tokyo, Rogers and every other athlete at those Games competed in an empty stadium because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was a much different atmosphere at a loud Stade de France on Sunday.
"It means everything," Rogers said of having her support group in attendance. "My parents flew here. One of my best friends flew [here] from California. My cousins flew from New Zealand. Another family friend came from home. There's so many people here.
"For them to get that Olympic experience, finally, is huge. It means so much to have them here cheering me on and I know it means a lot to them [to] witness an Olympic Games."
Canada'a Leduc advances to 200m semis
Sprinter Audrey Leduc, another national record holder, automatically qualified for the women's semifinals in the 200 with a 22.88-second effort for third in her heat but was later spotted limping up a ramp after exiting the track.
"I'm tired but that's the Olympics. It's the end of the season [but] it's exciting too," Leduc said. "This is my first big meet at the international level. The first one is nice … you take it in. I'm living in the moment.
"Before the start [of Sunday's heat the crowd] was clapping for the long jump [athletes] and it was [a feeling] like, 'Oh my gosh.'"
WATCH | Audrey Leduc advances to 200m semifinals:
Leduc, from Gatineau, Que., left a mark in her Olympic debut, winning her heat in the 100 last Monday and setting a Canadian record in 10.95 to beat her previous best of 10.96.
Ottawa native Jacqueline Madogo, who won the national title last year, ran in a separate heat Sunday and placed seventh in a 22.78 personal best. Madogo will move on to the repechage round on Monday.
Rising Canadian star Morales Williams reaches 400 semis
Fellow Canadian record holder Christopher Morales Williams qualified for the semifinals in the men's 400 metres, finishing second in the fifth of six heats with a time of 44.96 seconds. Grenada's Kirani James edged the Maple, Ont., native by 0.18 seconds.
The semifinals are set for Tuesday at 1:35 p.m. ET, one day after Morales Williams's 20th birthday.
WATCH l Morales Williams qualifies for 400m semis:
The rising star is the NCAA indoor and outdoor champion in the distance.
"I think the hardest part today was just getting the confidence to know that I belong here and can run," he said. "It's just a bit of a stress being on such a big level, I'm just a kid from the NCAA.
"But now, I just belong just like all the other guys. ... Being able to get out of these prelims, I was like, 'It's not that bad. It's just like any other 400."'
Morales Williams also won the event at the Southeastern Conference outdoor championships in a world-leading time of 44.05 seconds on May 11 in Gainesville, Fla.
The performance lowered Tyler Christopher's 44.44 Canadian mark from 2005, Fred Kerley's meet record of 44.09 from 2017, along with his school's and the facility's records.
In women's 400m hurdles, Savannah Sutherland narrowly qualified for Tuesday's 2:07 p.m. ET semifinals, beating Paulien Couckuypt of Belgium by 1-10th of a second for third in her heat. The top three automatically advance.
WATCH | Sutherland squeezes her way into hurdles semifinals:
Canadian trio not semifinal-bound
Earlier Sunday, Ceili McCabe and Regan Yee opened Day 4 of track and field competition for Canada in the 3,000 steeplechase.
After Yee was 12th and last in the opening heat in nine minutes 27.81 seconds — only the top five from each advance to the final — McCabe threatened her 9:20.58 national record with a 9:20.71 clocking for seventh in the second of three heats.
Craig Thorne of Quispamsis, N.B., was unsuccessful in his bid to reach the semifinals of the men's 110m hurdles. Needing a top-three finish in his heat, the 23-year-old crossed the finish line in 13.60 for seventh.
He won a second Canadian title five weeks ago in Montreal, where he stopped the clock in 13.65.
U.S. hurdler thankful for repechage round
In other hurdles action, American Freddie Crittenden took it easy for a very different reason. He felt a tweak during training and wanted to give his body a little more time to recover. So he went carefully and slowly over the hurdles to finish in a time of 18.27, more than five seconds slower than his season-best performance. He is going to take his chances in the repechage round to try to move on to the semifinals.
This is the first Olympics where track has used the repechage rule to give a second chance to hurdlers and to sprinters and middle-distance runners who don't move on from their opening heats in the 200 through 1,500m.
The 110m repechage round is Tuesday.
"I felt some pain," Crittenden said. "Thank God there's a repechage round for me."
WATCH | Crittenden feels 'tweak,' intentionally runs slow to qualify for repechage round:
War-torn Ukraine wins high jump gold
It was a night for war-torn Ukraine to rejoice.
Thousands of Ukrainians watched as high jumper Yaroslava Mahuchikh won gold for the country she was forced to flee, then celebrated with two teammates who also medalled at the Paris Olympics on Sunday.
Iryna Gerashchenko shared bronze in the high jump and Mykhaylo Kokhan then claimed a bronze in the hammer throw, too — doubling Ukraine's Olympic medal haul from three to six in the span of about an hour.
Ukrainian athletes take three more medals at the Olympic Games in Paris. <br><br>Yaroslava Mahuchikh wins gold and Iryna Gerashchenko wins bronze in high jump. Mykhaylo Kokhan earns bronze in hammer throw.<br>We are very proud!<br><br>Thank you for this result. Ukrainians know how to be strong… <a href="https://t.co/k7ackVxn5P">pic.twitter.com/k7ackVxn5P</a>
—@ZelenskyyUa"Medals are very important for Ukraine because the people are having a very happy time, and they can cheer us and they can celebrate this with us and not think about the war for one day," Kokhan said.
Mahuchikh, who left her home due to the war with Russia, earned Ukraine's first individual gold of the Paris Games, following a victory in women's team saber fencing on Saturday.
She is from Dnipro, a city of nearly 1 million located only about 100 kilometres from the front lines of the war. When Russia invaded, she piled as much as she could into her car and left town quickly. On her way out, she heard gunfire and could, at times, see shells raining down miles away.
The next time she returns, it will be as an Olympic champion.
"Almost 500 sportsman died in this war." Mahuchikh said. "They will never compete. They will never celebrate. They will never feel this atmosphere," she said, adding that her gold medal is "really for all of them."
Mahuchikh succeeds Tokyo gold medallist Maria Lasitskene, a Russian who — along with everyone else from her country — has been banned from track and field's international events since the country invaded Ukraine.
With files from Pat Graham, The Associated Press and The Canadian Press
