Just two weeks ago, the Canadian Men’s 4x100m relay team shocked the world and won gold at the Paris games.
Newly cemented gold medalist and Kelowna native Jerome Blake is still trying to wrap his head around his new title as an Olympic champion.
“I looked and seen Andre and Aaron jumping around in a circle and the stadium announcer said Canada wins… and I just lost my mind,” Blake said.
“I started running and jumping and screaming and I lost my voice, still isn’t back yet after two weeks.”
Blake was a part of the championship quartet running the second leg of the race and has been around the team since 2019 before competing in his first Olympics in Tokyo in 2020.
Since claiming Canada’s first gold medal in the 4x100m since 1996, Blake is taking everything in stride and slowly adjusting to life as an Olympic gold medalist.
“I had a birthday on the 18th of August, so I celebrated my birthday with some friends, and now I’m back to training,” he said.
“I still have a couple more meets before I can really go celebrate with my family and friends back home, so I’ll be back in Canada soon and be able to go celebrate with my friends and family. so that’s kind of what I’ve been doing. Just staying calm and being locked in and training, because you don’t want to get too far away from competition mindset.”
Canada entered the final race having the slowest time in the qualifying heat and ranked 8th. Nobody expected much from the Canadian team.
“Everyone else counted us out,” Blake said.
“It’s more or less like we have so much faith and belief in each other to the point where we were like before we even went out there, we said we knew we were going to win a medal, we just didn’t know which colour.”
Blake says he’s keeping his gold medal safe and secure before heading out to his next track meet. After that, the B.C. native will return to Vancouver for some well-earned down time.