Pan Am Games: Assessing Canada's performance

One of the biggest sporting events in ever held in Canada is done and in the books.

After Sunday night's star-studded closing ceremonies at the Pan Am Games, Canada's athletes are packing up and heading home — and a record number of them are carrying medals.

Freelance sports reporter Ed Klajman has been covering the games, and he joined CBC Hamilton Monday morning to talk about Team Canada's performance and how it sets up expectations for the Rio Olympics next summer.

You can listen to his interview with reporter Adam Carter in the player above, or read an abriged Q&A below.

Q: Canada won 217 medals, and 78 of them were gold. How did team Canada's performance measure up to expectations?

I think they just smashed through expectations no matter how you look at it. The big goal was to be among the top two in the country list, and there was realization that the United States was going to be very difficult to beat, but they wanted to be ahead of everybody else.

So those 217 medals were way ahead of Brazil in third at 141, and reasonably competitive with the United States at 265.

To put that in context, at the last Pan Am Games in 2011, Canada came in fifth with 119 medals. They smashed the record for total number of medals and gold medals that was set in Winnipeg in 1999.

Q: The event itself was larger than the 2010 winter Olympics in Vancouver, and even the summer games in Montreal back in 1976. What stood out for you as the big stories of the Pan Am Games?

I think the main thing that jumps out at me was how there was so much negativity, really in the years leading up to this, building all the way through to when it got closer and closer. It culminated on the day of the opening ceremony, when the New York Times ran with an article that said, "The Pan Am Games land in Toronto with a thud."

Then, all of a sudden, it only took a day or two of competition and everything changed. There was no traffic gridlock, none of the logistical nightmares materialized, and people realized that this was high level competition with Canadian athletes doing well.

The venues were great, and it was really difficult to get a ticket. Things were selling out. The momentum built more and more to the point that by the end of it, everyone is saying "Oh, it's too bad these were over. I wish they could last longer."

That's a remarkable turnaround.

Q: For many athletes, a medal at these games qualified them for Rio next summer – or at least created important momentum heading into the final year before the summer Olympics. Who are some of the athletes to watch coming out of these games?

We've got so many great athletes to watch. Ryan Cochrane in the swimming pool in the 1,500 metres, Damien Warner in the decathlon, young Andre De Grasse the sprinter is going to be a phenomenal talent in the coming years, Derek Drouin in the high jump.

In the team events, Hamilton's Kia Nurse in basketball – what an outstanding performance against the Americans. She's going to be leading a really strong Canadian basketball team for many years to come. The men's basketball team was really strong as well.

Across the board, Canada is looking really good for the Rio games.

Q: Obviously some of the world's best athletes were not competing in the last two weeks. There are even suggestions that the Americans didn't send their A team in some cases. How much does team Canada's performance at the Pan Am Games actually tell us about how they could do in Rio?

It's different from sport to sport – because for some sports that have a direct entry into Rio, the Americans did send their very best, in sports like water polo and field hockey and equestrian.

In other sports you have the world championships happening right now in the case of swimming or in the case of a couple of weeks in track and field, and those are the big marquee events where all the medals are won.

There, the Americans rested their top athletes, whereas Canada sent their very best. So in that sense there's a lot to say that it wasn't as strong a field as you're going to get.

But – the Canadian athletes put in a lot of personal bests, their times that they registered in races were world class and could've been on the podium against the world's very best.

Q: There's plenty of talk about how these games set the stage for another Canadian bid to host the Olympics in 2024. The head of the Canadian Olympic Committee says that he would support a Toronto bid. How likely is that?

I think it's tough to say. But overall, if I had to guess, I would have to say they're going to go for it. The deadline is September the 15th, so that's not much time to get things together for Toronto – but with the Canadian Olympic Committee behind them, and with so much of a groundswell and Toronto having proven itself so strongly, I suspect they're going to find a way to do it.

But if they do, the competition is tough – Boston, Rome, Paris – these are really tough competitor cities. But it'll be interesting to see if Toronto does do it. They could very well pull it off.