Only the 1984 Games in Los Angeles (44 medals) and the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta (22) exceeded Canada's output in Beijing. And with 12 fourth-place finishes at these Games - including three more Saturday - the Canadian team came agonizingly close to registering its best-ever result at a non-boycotted Olympics.
It's a performance that is sure to please the Canadian Olympic Committee, especially considering the team didn't even register a podium finish until the eighth day of competition. With just 12 medal events left Sunday, the team will likely accomplish its goal of a top-16 overall finish. Canada is currently tied for 13th with Belarus, two ahead of Spain and the Netherlands.
GOLD - Carol Huynh, Wrestling (48-kg Freestyle)
Canadian freestyle wrestler Carol Huynh won a gold medal at the Beijing Olympics, defeating Chiharu Icho of Japan in the women's 48-kilogram final at the China Agricultural University Gymnasium. Huynh posted a 4-0, 2-0 win for her first career Olympic medal. The 27-year-old from Hazelton, B.C., won gold at last year's Pan American Games and a bronze medal at the 2005 world championship. She also won silver in the 46-kilogram division at the 2001 world championship and bronze at the 2000 event.
The men's eight crew capped a three-medal day for Canada at the Olympic rowing regatta by capturing a gold medal. They won their race in five minutes 23.89 seconds.
"I knew that we had won it, there was nobody coming back at that point," coxswain Brian Price said of raising his arms near the finish line.
"I kept telling them to keep on cranking."
Eric Lamaze of Schomberg, Ont., captured the show jumping title Thursday at the Beijing Games, giving Canada its first-ever individual equestrian gold. Lamaze, aboard Hickstead, posted back-to-back clean runs in his first two rounds before winning a jump-off with Sweden's Rolf-Goran Bengtsson for his second medal of the Games. It's just the second individual show jumping medal for Canada in Olympic history. Michel Vaillancourt won an individual silver medal at the 1976 Games in Montreal.
SILVER - Dave Calder and Scott Frandsen, Rowing (Men's Pairs)
Canadian rowers Dave Calder and Scott Frandsen captured a silver medal at the Beijing Olympics. Calder, from Victoria, and Frandsen, from Kelowna, B.C., clocked a time of six minutes 39.55 seconds, nearly five seconds ahead of the bronze medallists from New Zealand. The Canadians were about two seconds behind Australia for gold. Calder rowed in the men's pair four years ago in Athens.
Karen Cockburn will go down in history as one of Canada's most reliable Olympians. The 27-year-old from Toronto held her nerve in a tense trampoline final Monday to earn the silver medal, even though she was bouncing on a sore knee. It's her third Olympic medal in as many Games. Only three other Canadian athletes have done the same in a non-team or non-relay event.
Canadian Simon Whitfield has won another Olympic medal. The Kingston, Ont., native won silver in triathlon on Tuesday, finishing five seconds behind German gold medallist Jan Frodeno's time of one hour 48 minutes 53 seconds.
"I kind of fought my way on there, and I thought there's no time like the present," Whitfield said. "I tried to make it a battle of pure willpower. I gave it everything I had."
Toronto's Jason Burnett has won a silver medal in trampoline at the Beijing Olympics. Burnett finished second with 40.7 points. The 21-year-old executed a tricky routine with an unforgiving degree of difficulty. The three-time Canadian champion was performing at his first Olympics.
Canadian diver Alexandre Despatie has won a silver medal in men's three-metre springboard at the Beijing Olympics. Despatie scored 536.65 to earn his second silver in the event in as many Games. He also came second at the 2004 Athens Games. Despatie, 23, of Laval, Que., had the second-best score in the morning preliminaries which reduced the final to 12 from 18. The divers' score was reduced to zero for the six-dive final.
Canada has won a silver medal in Olympic equestrian team show jumping, after losing a jump-off with the United States. The U.S. won gold when their first three riders executed clean rounds in the jump-off. Henselwood, Canada's lead rider, had picked up four faults. It was Millar's first medal in nine Olympic appearances.
Emilie Heymans of Greenfield Park, Que. won the silver medal in women's 10-metre platform diving at the Beijing Olympics. Heymans led after her final dive but was bumped to silver by Chen Ruolin, who finished off the competition with a near perfect dive that earned a score of 100.30. Heymans won a silver medal in synchronized diving with Anne Montminy in 2000 and a bronze with Blythe Hartley four years later.
SILVER - Karine Sergerie, Taekwondo (Women's 67kg division)
Karine Sergerie of Sainte-Catherine, Que., was forced to settle for Olympic silver after losing a tight final in taekwondo's 67-kilogram division 2-1 to Hwang Kyungseon on Friday. The South Korean picked up the decisive point in the third round as Sergerie went for a strike. Hwang spun and scored the go-ahead point with a counter-kick to Sergerie's midsection. Sergerie's last-chance attempts to tie things up fell short.
SILVER - Adam van Koeverden, K-1 500-metres
Adam van Koeverden fought off self-doubt and a sleepless night to find redemption with an Olympic silver medal in the men's K1 500-metre race Saturday. With the shock of Friday's eighth-place finish in the men's K-1 1,000 metres still fresh in his mind, van Koeverden led most of the way in the 500, just fighting off Britain's Tim Brabants to finish second in one minute 37.630 seconds. Aussie Ken Wallace won gold in 1:37.252, while Brabants finished a hair behind van Koeverden at 1:37.671.
After Carol Huynh's gold medal win the women's 48-kilogram final, Tonya Verbeek added a bronze medal about 25 minutes later by beating Sweden's Ida-Theres Nerell 1-0, 1-0 in the 55-kilogram category. Verbeek, from Beamsville, Ont., won silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics as well as a bronze at the 2005 world championship.
"I won a match to get the bronze and you're losing a match to get the silver," Verbeek said. "So it is a different feeling."
Victoria's Ryan Cochrane has won a bronze medal in the 1,500-metre freestyle at the Beijing Games, finally giving Canada its first medal in the pool since the Sydney Games in 2000. Coming into Sunday, Canada's best finish in the pool was a fourth in the 200-metre backstroke. Cochrane's medal came on the last day of swimming at the National Aquatics Centre or Water Cube.
Melanie Kok of St. Catharines, Ont., and Tracy Cameron of Shubenacadie, N.S., just managed to hold off a German crew for bronze. They finished in 6:56.68, beating out the Germans for third by a mere 0.04 seconds.
"I thought we had it," said Cameron. "When we looked over I could see that our bow ball was definitely in front of the Germans.
Earlier, the men's four crew of Iain Brambell of Victoria, Jon Beare of Toronto, Mike Lewis of Victoria and Liam Parsons of Thunder Bay, Ont., posted a time of 5:50.09 for bronze.
"We started everything we could in the first 500 to get ourselves into the race and essentially through the middle it's a dogfight, everybody wants a piece of it," said Brambell.
Canada used a late surge to solidify a claim on a medal, and almost moved into second place in the final leg.
Canada's Priscilla Lopes-Schliep has captured bronze in the women's 100-metre hurdles at the Beijing Olympics. The 25-year-old from Whitby, Ont., raced to a time of 12.64 seconds Tuesday night in a packed 91,000-seat Bird's Nest stadium. It was Canada's first track medal since the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, where Donovan Bailey won gold in the 100 metres and the men's 4x100 relay team also finished first.
Canada's Thomas Hall won a bronze medal in the men's C-1 1,000-metre canoe race at the Beijng Games on Friday. He finished third in three minutes 53.653 seconds on a hot, sunny afternoon at the Shunyi Olympic Rowing-Canoeing Park. Hall caught Vadim Menkov of Uzbekistan in the final 200 metres and finished about half a second ahead of him to reach the podium.
"All adrenaline," Hall said. "I couldn't feel a thing. It was really great."
Later, Kenaz
