Canada’s most decorated Para-swimmer of the past decade will enter her fourth Paralympic Games with world records in three events.
The 28-year-old Quebecer from Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, who has five gold medals and 10 in total, said her main challenge in Paris will be to be faster than ever before.
“I have to fight. My biggest rival is myself,” Rivard explained. “It requires a different approach, when you’re the one everyone’s chasing, rather than the one trying to get a ranking or a medal. I’m a competitor. And I’m passionate about my discipline. I’m going to show up there, do my best, compete against the other girls and try to stay at the front of the pack as much as possible,” she added.
“If I can get as close as possible to my world records, or even break them, then technically the medals should follow,” Rivard summed up.
The Paris Paralympic Games will begin on Wednesday with the opening ceremony and end on September 8.
The Canadian delegation includes 126 athletes in 18 disciplines, and they are supported by 117 coaches and support staff from the country’s various sports federations.
Swimming events begin Thursday at La Défense Arena, where Ontario’s Summer McIntosh shone with a three-gold medal haul, and four records in total, at the Paris Olympics.
“Here to win medals”
Rivard, who won three gold medals at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Games, will have a similar schedule to McIntosh’s in Paris, with four individual events, plus relays, on his calendar in just 10 days.
She holds world records in the 50, 100 and 400m freestyle S10.
Rivard, who has a left hand disability, will also compete in the 100m backstroke. She is the defending champion in the 100m and 400m freestyle.
“It’s extremely difficult to stay focused and at the top of your game for 10 days in a row,” Rivard said. “I’ve been working on that. I try to swim three weekends in a row during the year.”
“It works well because my program is pretty much spread out over 10 days. I can kind of break it down into three little blocks, and tailor my preparation around that,” she continued.
The 22 Canadian swimmers include three Paralympic champions and five world champions. They took part in a 10-day training camp in Vichy.
“The first objective is to achieve the best times or improve our rankings,” said head coach Martin Gingras.
“It’s not about putting pressure on our athletes by putting a number on how many medals we want to win. We’re obviously here to win medals, that’s for sure, 100 per cent, but if we want that to happen then we need to make sure our athletes are ready to be fast.”
Canadians have won eight medals at each of the last two Paralympic Games, including three gold, three silver and two bronze at the Tokyo Games three years ago.
Rivard’s first Paralympic medal was silver, at the London 2012 Games, when she was just 16. The Tokyo Games were postponed by a year, from 2020 to 2021, because of the coronavirus pandemic.
— With contributions from Gregory Strong, The Canadian Press