Chasing your Dreams - A Canadian Story

On Tuesday afternoon, I visited the Temple of Heaven (which I'll write about later). While I was there, I ran into a couple from Canada, so I introduced myself, and asked about their Beijing experience. It turns out that the women is a Canadian athlete named Leigh Hobson, here with her husband Jeff.

Leigh competed in the Women's Road Cycling event on Sunday and finished 17th, which was the highest finish of any North American competitor. In addition, she was only 28 seconds off the winning time, after a 3.5 hour race.

What's even more interesting is that this is her first and her last Olympics.

She celebrated her 38th birthday on Sunday (race day), while her two Canadian teammates are 24 and 26, and she is a school teacher in Cambridge who took a two year sabbatical in order to try to qualify and compete in the Olympics. She qualified with a bronze at a world cup event in Montreal, competed here, and is now retired from competition.

Leigh and Jeff were really nice (typically Canadian) and I enjoyed meeting them. They are spending the next week on vacation here in Beijing. Leigh's story is the kind of story that makes me love the Olympics.