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- Laumann, Silken
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- Wood, John
- Young, Mike
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Name:
LAUMANN, Silken
Sport:
Rowing
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Date of Birth:
Place of Birth:
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Once in a while, Canadian sports fans tend to get excited about something – mostly hockey. It happened in 1972 when Paul Henderson (then a Mississauga resident) scored that most famous of all hockey goals in the last minute of the final game to give Canada the series win over the Soviets in the clash of all ages. It happened again 30 years later in Salt Lake City when an other rendition of Team Canada captured the country’s first Olympic hockey gold in a half a century. But getting fired up about rowing? Strange as it seems, it did happen – and the athlete flaming Canadian sports pride was Mississauga’s Silken Laumann. The year was 1992 and Silken was racing in the Olympic final of the women’s single sculls in Barcelona, Spain. Win or lose, it didn’t matter, she already was a hero. Although Canadians were keeping collective fingers crossed for a gold, the fact that Silken was at the starting line was nothing short of a miracle, a triumph of the human spirit and a testimony to a special athlete’s determination and desire. Barely a year earlier, in the summer of 1991, it was widely predicted that Laumann would be a shoo-in to win an Olympic gold, having completed a remarkable season in which she was the overall winner in a series of six races for the World Cup, then crowned world champion in a single winner-take-all race in Vienna. Honour after honour was bestowed on Laumann, including the Lou Marsh Trophy as Canada’s female athlete of the year. She was also named Mississauga’s outstanding female athlete. The rowing world was her oyster. Then tragedy struck. In May 1992, with a little more than two months before the Barcelona Olympics, Silken was fine-tuning her preparation, competing in a race in Essen, Germany. She was warming up for the race when, out of nowhere, a German boat crushed into her shell, severing muscles, ligaments and tendons midway up her right shin and down her to ankle. Initial medical reports said she would never race again. The blow was softened somewhat when later examinations determined that this wouldn’t be the end of her rowing career. But the experts said there was no way she would race in Barcelona. The lone dissenter was Silken Laumann, she was determined to make it – and she did. Rest, rehabilitation, hard work and more determination that most people process did what seemed impossible two months before the Olympics. She not only made it to Barcelona, but incredibly on August 3, Silken Laumann was one of the finalists in the 2,000 women’s sculls. In Mississauga and the rest of the country, many viewers who normally wouldn’t give a fig about watching a sports event on television, were glued to their television sets on a mid-summer August night. In Barcelona, it was morning, but because of the time zone difference, in Ontario it was 3 o’clock in the middle of the night, not your normal TV watching time. CTV went on the air just to show the women’s single sculls finals. As ratings showed, the event attracted numbers comparable to chart-topping Hockey Night in Canada telecasts. Nobody really expected her to win and few even dared to think she could make it to the medal podium, but there she was in fourth place halfway through the race. “I knew I couldn’t win, but I wanted one of the medals,” Silken said. ”Fourth is the worst position, you just miss a medal.” |
When the medals were handed out, Silken Laumann was on the presentation podium, to her the glow of a bronze as bright as a gold. In its coverage, The New York Times reported: “Laumann has touched her nation a million times.” The bronze in Barcelona was one of three Olympic medals Silken had won during her remarkable competitive career. In her 1984 Olympic debut in Los Angeles, she teamed with her older sister Danielle – who got her interested in rowing in the first place – and won a bronze. They were coached by Fred Loek at the Don Rowing Club in Port Credit. Then in her Olympic swan song, 12 years later on Lake Lanier just outside Atlanta, she won a silver. “I’m happy with myself,” said Laumann. “At the end of the day, it’s not the medals you remember.” Silken certainly has a lot to remember. She has been showered with recognition and many awards, including the Lou Marsh Award as Canada’s Outstanding Athlete, and was inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1998 and, at the 25th anniversary of Mississauga awards dinner a year later, into the Mississauga Sports Hall of Fame alongside her sister Danielle and their first coach, Fred Loek. Silken was also recipient of the Wilma Rudolph Courage Award in 1997, the first time this award was given to a non-American; awarded the Meritorious Service Medal of Canada in 1993; voted Canadian of the Year by the Canadian Club; and awarded the Lou Marsh Award as Canada’s Top Athlete in 1992; voted Canadian Female Athlete of the Year in 1991 and ’92; named Mississauga’s Female Athlete of the Year four times (sharing the award with her sister Danielle in 1984, then solo in 1990, ’91 and ’92); awarded honourary Doctorate of Laws from the universities of Victoria, McMaster and Windsor. The only blot in her career happened in 1995 when she inadvertently consumed banned substance in cough medication and got stripped of the Pan American Games quadruple gold. She became a motivational speaker after her Olympic career, inspiring audiences across Canada and the U.S. as she shared her story of courage, perseverance and the triumph of the human spirit. |
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