Background[]
- Gina Grain is on the 2008 Olympic team for Canada (also known as CAN)
in cycling. - Event: Track and Road
- Birthdate: June 16, 1974
- Hometown: Vancouver
- Club: TeamExpressCopy.com
- Member of National Team Since: 2003
Insights[]
Some people are easily discouraged. Any bump in the road causes them to veer off course. Gina Grain rides right over bumps in the road without even braking. In high school, she blew out both knees within three weeks of each other, effectively ending her soccer career. Most people would mourn the loss of their athletic career and move on to something less physically taxing. Grain became an Olympic cyclist.
Grain obviously made the right choice of sport after her knee injuries. After six national championships, she will call Beijing’s Olympic velodrome her home away from home this summer, as she chases her first Olympic medal. A national team member since 2001, Grain has compiled quite the resume on the track, including a silver medal at the World Track Championships and two Pan American Championship bronze medals (2007 in Track and 2005 in Road). She was the top-ranked Track Scratch cyclist in the International Cycling Union in 2006.
The Vancouver native will make her Olympic Games debut this summer, more than 15 years after her soccer career was shelved by injury. The focus and determination she has shown just to get to this point – the Olympic Games – will serve her well on the Olympic stage.