Olympic News Circle: Summer & Winter Olympics

CAROL HUYNH: First Canada Olympic Gold Medalist in Beijing 2008 Olympic Games

OMG! Canada finally ends medal drought with carol huynh winning a gold medal in wrestling event at Beijing 2008 Olympics.

Good for her and Canada! I’m sure many people will be proud of her. Thank you for bringing Canada National Anthem to Beijing Olympic!

Canada scores gold, silver and bronze today. Canadian wrestlers Carol Huynh and Tonya Verbeek won gold and bronze medals while David Calder and Scott Frandsen won silver in men’s pair rowing all within about an hour on Saturday.
Watch Carol Huynh Gold Medal Ceremony after this commercial.



Canada Nation Anthem at Gold Medal Ceremony


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Wrestler Huynh wins Canada’s first gold
BEIJING — First, Carol Huynh blew kisses to her family.

They were easy to pick out among the crowd the China Agricultural University Gymnasium, what with the red-and-white hand-made “Go Carol” T-shirts they were all wearing.

Then Huynh waved in every direction as she ascended the podium, her smile a permanent beam of white light. Then the tears came and they kept coming, but the smile never wavered.

“Tears of happiness,” Huynh explained.

Finally, as O Canada was played, Huynh lost the battle to contain herself and was overcome with emotion.

Why not?

She was an Olympic champion after all.

Huynh of Hazelton, B.C., the daughter of Vietnamese boat people who came to Canada as refugees, brought the country its first gold medal of the Beijing Games, defeating two-time reigning world champion Icho Chiharu of Japan 2-0 to take the 48-kilogram women’s freestyle wrestling title Saturday at the China Agricultural University Gymnasium.

Huynh won the first period 4-0 and took the second period 2-1. The first athlete to win two periods is the winner.

Huynh’s victory was followed by a bronze-medal effort from Tonya Verbeek, of Beamsville, Ont., in the women’s 55-kilogram division.

“It’s a great day for Canadian wrestling,” said Verbeek’s coach, Marty Calder. “I’m so happy to be part of this.”

Huynh had never beaten Chiharu before, but took it to the 2004 Olympic silver medallist, beating her to the punch with her lightning-quick moves.

“I knew that I had to set the tone and make sure I wrestled my match and it worked,” Huynh said. “When I took her out of bounds for the three points (in the first round), at that point I knew I had her.”

There was no sign of Huynh’s name anywhere on the pre-competition list of medal contenders issued by the International Olympic Committee and she was fine what that.

“I was OK with kind of flying under the radar,” Huynh said, while adding her own pre-competition assessment of her gold-medal chances. “I knew it was a possibility.”

As the day progressed and Huynh made short work of one opponent after another, it seemed more like a probability.

When it became a reality late Saturday afternoon, the ever-smiling Huynh broke down and bawled like a little girl who’d skinned her knee, not a compact dynamo who’d skunked all the best wrestlers in the world.

Stepping up to accept her gold medal, she was absolutely delighted to shine in the spotlight.

“I was waving to my family especially and to all of my friends and teammates and coaches and then I was just waving at any Canadian flag I could see,” Huynh said. “I was just thinking how proud I am to be Canadian and about the road I took to get here. It’s been a long one, but a good one.”

Read more: canada.com

Canada’s Huynh grapples to gold
Wrestler Carol Huynh of Hazelton, B.C., has won Canada’s first gold medal of the Beijing Olympics.

The 27-year-old captured gold on Day 8 of the Games in the 48-kilogram freestyle weight class over Japan’s Chiharu Icho by a score of 4-0 and 2-1.

Huynh threw her hands in the air and covered her mouth in awe after winning Canada’s first gold medal. The Canadian’s coaches then hoisted her on their shoulders and paraded her around the stadium with the Canadian flag.

Huynh’s victory came less than 20 minutes before Tonya Verbeek of Beamsville, Ont., won the bronze medal in the 55-kg weight class.

She began crying on the podium, wiping away tears and singing as the Canadian anthem was played for the first time at the Beijing Games.

“I was just thinking how proud I am to be Canadian,” Huynh said of her reaction. “And I was just thinking about the road to how I got here. It’s been a long one but a good one.”

Canada’s first medal of the 2008 Summer Games was a silver won by rowers David Calder and Scott Frandsen, but it was Huynh who guaranteed the country’s first, fighting her way to the gold medal final earlier in the day Saturday.

“This is unbelievable,” she told CBC Sports following the medal ceremony. “I knew I wanted to go in with supreme confidence in my abilities, and not doubting myself one second. That’s what I did, and I wrestled the match of my life, and it was awesome.”

She is the second Canadian woman wrestler to win an Olympic medal, the first being Verbeek, who won silver in Athens.

Beijing marked the first Olympic Games for Huynh, whose parents, husband and siblings were in the stands watching.

Read more: cbc.ca