Pan Am: Canada dives into medal haul
 Heymans and Marleau Canadian Press
7/26/2007 9:39:15 PM
RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (CP) - A double-gold day in diving sparked a 10-medal performance by Canada at the Pan American Games on Thursday.
The Canadian women's soccer team also rallied from a pair of embarrassing losses to capture a bronze.
Canada added four medals in wrestling - a gold, two silver and a bronze - and a pair of bronze in karate, while the men's water polo team heads home with bronze.
Canada remains fourth in the medal standings with 89 - 26 gold, 32 silver, 41 bronze. The U.S. leads with 186 (79-69-38), Brazil is second with 117 (35-31-51), while Cuba is third with 87 (35-20-32). Medals standings are calculated by the number of gold medals won.
Alexandre Despatie of Laval, Que., shrugged off the boos from the pro-Brazilian crowd to capture gold in the men's three-metre springboard event Thursday, while Emilie Heymans of Longueuil, Que., and Marie-Eve Marleau of Laval, Que., topped the women's 10-metre synchronized platform competition.
Despatie finished with 503.65 points while Cesar Castro of Brazil took the silver with 492.70 and American Troy Dumais was third with 484.25.
''Audience's boos in my last dives were useful to make me train my focus,'' Despatie said. ''Since it had never happened to me before, I took it as a test to check how it will be in Beijing (2008 Olympics). I'm very satisfied to take this gold medal to my country.''
Heymans and Marleau won their competition with 327.30 points. Mexico's Paola Espinosa and Tatiana Ortiz Galicia were second with 325.14 while Americans Haley Ishimatsu and Mary Beth Dunnichay were third, 29.76 points back.
''We practised a lot and came here to do our best. We didn't win by accident,'' said Heymans. ''It was a tough competition, but we got what we wanted, which was the first position.''
Carol Huynh of Hazelton, B.C., led Canada's wrestling team, defeating Ingrid Medrano of El Salvador to win gold in the 48-kilogram category.
''A few countries are starting to pay attention to women's wrestling,'' said Huynh. ''In Canada, the women's wrestling started to evolve about 15 years ago.''
Ohenewa Akuffo of Brampton, Ont., took silver in the 72-kilogram class, losing to American Kristie Marano in the gold-medal bout.
Tonya Verbeek, a native of Beamsville, Ont., defeated Tahamara Barron of Mexico to win a bronze medal in the 65-kilogram category. Verbeek, a silver medallist at the 2004 Athens Olympics, had earlier lost to American Marcie Vandusen in the semifinals of the women's 55-kilogram wrestling division.
''I am not very happy with my performance in the Games,'' Verbeek said. ''For a moment I lost my focus. When I tried to get back into the fight again, I couldn't do it. You have to learn from your mistakes and move ahead.''
Megan Dolan of St. Catharines, Ont., collected bronze with a win over Cuba's Candida de Armas.
Christine Sinclair of Burnaby, B.C., and Ottawa's Kristina Kiss scored to lead Canada to a 2-1 soccer win over Mexico. The win was some consolation after earlier disappointment for the Canadians in Rio and a positive ending to the tournament as the team heads into the World Cup in China.
The Canadians had a major wakeup call when they were thrashed 7-0 by Brazil in their final preliminary-round game, and then went on to lose 2-1 to an under-20 U.S. team.
''Overall, it was a better performance than before,'' Canadian coach Even Pellerud said after the win. ''So it's good to finish off on a good note, but it was never great. This is not the World Cup level, we need to get better.''
The men's water polo team won the bronze with a 9-5 win over Cuba. Kevin Graham of Regina, Brandon Jung of Surrey, B.C., and Aaron Feltham of Lindsay, Ont., scored two goals apiece to lead Canada.
''It was a very physical and tough match because we were disappointed with (Wednesday's) result (a 10-6 semifinal loss to Brazil),'' said Noah Miller of Regina. ''We had to overcome this bruise.''
In karate, Philippe Poirier of Gatineau, Que., had to settle for bronze after losing to Colombia's Gilbert Ocoro in the 75-80 kilogram class. Jennifer Guillette of Granby, Que., also finished with bronze after a loss to Cheili Gonzalez of Guatemala in the under-53 kg. class.
Canada's women's softball team earned a semifinal matchup against the U.S., after beating Puerto Rico 6-3 and Venezuela 1-0. The Canadians finished round-robin action 3-0.
In other action Thursday:
- Angus Mortimer of Ottawa and Benjamin Russell of Dartmouth, N.S., are through to two more finals in canoe/kayak. Mortimer finished second in his heat to advance in the men's K-1 500-metre kayak competition while Russell won his heat in the men's C-1 500-metre canoe event. Both paddlers advanced Wednesday in their respective 1,000-metre events. On the women's side, Jill D'Alessio of Middle Sackville, N.S., won her K1 500-metre heat to advance straight to the final.
- Canada is second after the team technical routine in synchronized swimming. Montrealers Jessika Dubuc, Marie-Pierre Gagne, Eve Lamoureaux and Tracy Little, along with Dominika Kopcik of Surrey, B.C., Elise Marcotte of Ancienne-Lorette, Que., Jennifer Song of Calgary and Isabelle Rampling of Burlington, Ont., combined for 94.833 points. The U.S., was first with a score of 95.000.
- Jill Henselwood of Oxford Mills, Ont., and Ian Millar of Perth, Ont., were No. 1 and 2 respectively after the first qualifying round in show jumping. Canada - Henselwood, Millar, Mac Cone of King City, Ont., and Eric Lamaze of Schomberg, Ont., - also leads in the team jumping after the first round.
- In rhythmic gymnastics, Alexandre Orlando of Toronto leads after the individual qualifying round in rope, clubs and ring. But she received no score in ribbon after her ribbon separated from the wand. That dropped Orlando to 12th in the all-around, and she didn't advance for the all-around final. The Canadian team finished third in group all-around qualifying.
- Bowler Jason Kovack of Windsor, Ont., lost in the men's single semifinal to Lucas Legnani of Argentina.
- Marie-Pier Beaudet of Levis, Que., and Kristen Niles of Fredericton, N.B., were both eliminated in the second round of the women's individual archery competition. Beaudet lost 103-99 to Natalia Sanchez of Colombia while Niles fell 110-99 to Larissa Pagan of Cuba. Kateri Vrakking of Toronto lost her first outing 106-105 to Brazil's Petra Ruocco.
- The men's basketball team dropped its second straight matchup, losing 98-63 to Brazil.
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