GLASGOW, Scotland — Catharine Pendrel, whose life story spans Canada from New Brunswick to Victoria, won the women’s mountain bike gold medal here Tuesday at the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
A decision she made in Victoria has proven fruitful for Pendrel, who cycled the 32K course in one hour, 39 minutes, 29 seconds.
The native of Harvey Station, N.B., began her sporting career as a casual athlete in the University of Victoria Triathlon Club before switching sports on the Island and placing fourth at the 2008 Beijing Summer Olympics and winning the 2011 world mountain biking championships before a disappointing ninth place finish at the 2012 London Summer Olympics.
Pendrel previously told the Times Colonist she “met the two most hugely influential people in my life — husband Keith Wilson and coach Dan Proulx — at UVic and both on the first day of cycling practice.”
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It all paid off in grand fashion here with Commonwealth Games gold. Her emergence from part-time, casual athlete at UVic to world champion, two-time Olympian and now Commonwealth champion has been a fairly epic rise.
Pendrel said she didn’t think about specific medals Tuesday.
“I think if you get too focused on medals, it gets to your head,” she said.
But Pendrel didn’t let any head games get in the way at these Games.
“I found myself by myself [at the front of the pack] . . . I didn’t expect that,” she said.
Emily Batty of Toronto, who fractured her collarbone just four days before the 2012 London Summer Olympics but still battled to finish 24th, won the Commonwealth silver medal behind Pendrel in 1:40:39 ahead of bronze-medallist Rebecca Henderson of Australia.
In big Island stories scheduled for later Tuesday at the Games, two-time Olympic-medallist swimmer Ryan Cochrane goes for gold in the Tollcross Pool in the 1,500-metre freestyle while fellow Victoria Olympian Max Plaxton churns for glory in men’s mountain biking at Cathkin Braes Country Park.
Plaxton, raised in Tofino on a surfboard as part of a globetrotting Island family that also resided in Spain and Chile, will be trying to make up for a disappointing 2012 London Olympics when he was unable to finish the Games race.
“A month before the Olympics, I was on the Galloping Goose Trail and felt a sharp pain,” said Plaxton.
“It happened pretty much at the worst time. I did what I could in London and raced with an incredible amount of pain.”
The Islander is hoping for a much better result today in the Commonwealth Games.
“A medal is the goal,” he said.
Meanwhile, Cochrane qualified first Monday for the 1,500-metre swimming freestyle in 15:03.29.
“I felt really strong,” said the Victoria star.
“Now it’s all about [Tuesday night’s final]. I would be really happy to get close to the Commonwealth Games record.”
That would be the story coming full circle. The Commonwealth Games record — the then world record of 14:41.66 — was set by two-time Olympic gold-medallist Kieran Perkins of Australia at Victoria 1994 in the Saanich Commonwealth Place pool in which Cochrane now trains.
