More Olympic athletes back on home soil
Posted Aug 24, 2016 06:45:23 AM.
Last Updated Aug 24, 2016 09:01:27 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
TORONTO – For the second day in a row, Canadian Olympians returned home from the Rio Olympics to excited crowds of loved ones and fans.
Runner Andre De Grasse of Markham, Ont., who won a silver and two bronze medals, was the first to walk through the arrival gate at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport.
His mom Beverley joined him almost immediately. Click here to view the video.
“I’m just looking to go home and take some time off,” De Grasse said, adding that he was looking forward to his mom’s home cooking.
De Grasse was the first Canadian to win three sprint medals at a single Games.
Sandra Colaire, the mother of hurdler Nikkita Holder of Pickering, Ont., was also at Pearson with Holder’s two-and-a-half-year old son Kaedence Warner in her arms.
Colaire said it was hard to see Holder fall during the 100-metre hurdles semifinals but that she was still so proud of her daughter.
“Her spirits are great,” said Colaire. “The one question she had after the fall was, ‘Mom are you okay?'”
Other returning athletes include Derek Drouin, who won a gold medal in the high jump and Damian Warner, who captured bronze in the decathlon.
They followed two plane loads of Olympians who arrived home to a hero’s welcome early Tuesday, including star swimmer Penny Oleksiak. The Toronto teenager won four medals at the Rio Games, including Canada’s first gold.
