With the Paris Olympics less than a month away, Canadian sprinter and golden medalist Andre De Grasse feels like he’s rounding into form to be at his best at the 2024 Games.
The 29-year-old from Markham, Ont. earned his spot on the Canadian roster at the Olympic trials on June 28 in Montreal, winning the 100-metre race with a 10.20-second time, beating out Ottawa’s Eliezer Adjibi and Toronto’s Aaron Brown.
The qualification comes just a week after De Grasse set his season’s best time. On June 18, at the Paavo Nurmi Games in Turku, Finland, he matched the Olympic standard with a 10.00-second run.
“It’s coming fast, for real,” De Grasse said while appearing on Going Deep with Donnovan Bennett. “I’m feeling pretty good. I’m excited. It’s crazy to say that it’ll be my third Olympic Games. Time has gone by so fast since I was a young kid getting ready for Rio.”
At the 2020 Tokyo Games, De Grasse ran Canada to a gold medal in the 200-metre, a silver medal in the 4×100-metre relay and a bronze in the 100-metre, becoming the first Canadian man to win multiple Olympic medals in the 100.
Tokyo marked De Grasse’s second Olympic Games, following another three-medal performance in Rio in 2016, and he’s planning on using all of his experiences to his advantage this summer.
“Just knowing that I’ve been here before, I’ve done it plenty of times. I’ve done the repetitions in practice, I’ve put in the work, I’ve made the sacrifices,” De Grasse said when asked about how he stays calm in big moments. “I just know that when I get there, and when I get to the Games, you just go out there and enjoy the moment and have fun.
“The work has been done, now you trust in the process, and now you just gotta go out there and be yourself and bring your A-Game.”
A big basketball fan, De Grasse compared competing in an Olympic Games or World Championships to a Game 7 situation, citing the mentality NBA players might adopt with everything on the line.
“When I get to a championship, that extra adrenaline (and) just knowing what’s on the line and what you want to accomplish, it kind of brings the best out of me,” he said. “… I still have nerves, but it’s good nerves, it’s like, ‘yeah, I’ve been here before,’ and I just rely on that experience.”
De Grasse is coming off a 2023 season that saw him claim the 200-metre title in the Diamond League, running a season-best 19.76-second time at the race in Eugene, Ore.
Despite a few years of difficult results and injury, De Grasse said he feels like everything is rounding into shape at the perfect time.
“I’m in a good spot to run this fast, five weeks away from the Games,” he said. “I feel like I’m in a good spot to say, ‘OK, when I get to the Games, I’m definitely going to be able to run a personal best and run the best I’ve ever ran.”
Already the only Canadian man to ever win six medals, the goal remains the same for De Grasse this time around, as he looks to further add to his trophy case.
“I feel like my old self, and I’m ready to represent the country and do this all over again to try and bring back some medals.”
