Canadian gymnasts set to shine in front of home crowd at world championships
Canada’s top artistic gymnasts are taking on the world at home this year.
The 2017 FIG Artistic Gymnastics World Championships will be held at the Olympic Stadium in Montreal, October 2-8.
The first three days of competition will be focused on qualification before the individual all-around finals for men and women take place on Thursday October 5 and Friday October 6, respectively. The weekend will bring with it the individual apparatus finals. There are no team events in this post-Olympic season.
Here are the Canadian athletes to keep an eye on.
Ellie Black will lead the Canadian team as she heads into her fourth world championship appearance. In each of the last three years, she has moved from ninth at the 2014 Worlds to seventh at the 2015 Worlds to fifth at Rio 2016 in the individual all-around. Another two-place improvement would put Canada’s most decorated athlete from Toronto 2015 on the podium. She will be joined in La Belle Province by Olympic teammates Shallon Olsen and Isabela Onyshko. Both had advanced to individual apparatus finals at Rio 2016, where Olsen was among the elite eight on vault and Onsyhko impressed on beam.
RELATED: Black to lead Team Canada to artistic gymnastics worlds in Montreal
Worlds rookie Brooklyn Moors will complete the women’s squad. In her first year at the senior level, she is just a few weeks removed from winning gold on floor and bronze on vault at her first World Challenge Cup.
Scott Morgan, who was Canada’s only male artistic gymnast at Rio 2016, will also be competing at the world championships for the fourth time, focusing on his specialties – floor, rings and vault. But this time he won’t be alone. Joining him will be seven-time world team member and 2015 Pan Am Games horizontal bar silver medallist Kevin Lytwyn as well as Rio 2016 alternate Jackson Payne. These will be the third worlds for this year’s all-around national champion Zachary Clay and the second worlds for René Cournoyer, who will compete in front of a hometown crowd. Worlds rookie Thierry Pellerin rounds out the squad.
More than 500 gymnasts from 80 countries will compete in front of nearly 50,000 spectators. The star of the Montreal 1976 Olympic Games, Nadia Comaneci, will also be present as official spokesperson for the world championships.
Women’s Team
Ellie Black
Brooklyn Moors
Shallon Olsen
Isabela Onyshko
Brittany Rogers – Alternate
Rose Kaying Woo – Alternate
Men’s Team
Zachary Clay
Rene Cournoyer
Kevin Lytwyn
Scott Morgan
Jackson Payne
Thierry Pellerin
You can watch the competition live here and follow the results on the official Twitter account of the world championships.
