Gavin Baggs of Paradise clinches N.L.'s first gold medal of Canada Summer Games
The Paradise resident was the first person to cross the finish line in the men's 1,500-metre wheelchair race.
"It was an unexpected result with the wind and the rain today," Baggs said in a statement.
"In the end, I just put my head down, focused on what was ahead of me, and raced my heart out. To walk away with a gold for Team N.L. is an absolute honour."
A multi-sport athlete, Baggs is competing in his fourth Canada Games.
The 18-year-old also secured the province's first medal of the Games when he won silver in the men's 400-metre freestyle Para race last week.
According to the Canada Summer Games medal table, Newfoundland and Labrador has now won one gold medal, two silvers and a bronze.
Mark Miller is the head coach for athletics with Team N.L. He said Baggs worked hard leading up to the Games, and wanted to earn medals for the province.
"Very little was going to get in the way of that today — certainly not 60-kilometre winds. We're proud to have him representing Team N.L. this week," Miller said in a statement.
Baggs' mother, Raeleen Baggs, was watching Tuesday's race and said she felt "over the moon."
"It's been a long two weeks, and a couple more days left, but so exciting," she said. "It's just been incredible to watch him the last two weeks in the Games."
She said the 1,500-metre wheelchair race was tight in the first few laps, but her son pulled ahead later in the race, and during the last lap he "took off."
She said he doesn't tend to get nervous about competing, and that helps to her keep calm, too.
Baggs is scheduled to compete again on Friday in the men's 100-metre wheelchair heat race.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CTV News
2 minutes ago
- CTV News
Elks aim to continue successful balancing act on offence vs. Redblacks
Toronto Argonauts' Benjie Franklin (23) and Wynton McManis (48) tackle Edmonton Elks' Binjimen Victor (87) during first half CFL action in Edmonton, on Friday August 15, 2025. They've struck a balance, and it paid off on offence for the Edmonton Elks. The Canadian Football League club found traction in both their passing and rushing attacks, gathering 273 yards through the air and another 111 on the ground in a 28-20 win last Friday over the visiting Toronto Argonauts. And the Elks hope – nay, expect – the trend to continue this Friday against the Redblacks in Ottawa. 'We want to be a balanced attack – the screen game, a quick gain to him is an extension of the run game as well,' Elks head coach Mark Kilam told media on Monday, 'him' referring to Justin Rankin. The second-year running back led the Elks offensively for the second straight game against the Argos, tops on the team in both rushing and receiving yards for the second straight game. Quarterback Cody Fajardo, too, is making a difference in the Elks' on-field fortunes. The 33-year-old signal-caller leads the Canadian Football League in pass completion percentage (77.5) after Week 11 and has guided Edmonton to a 2-2 record in his four games as the starter since taking over from Tre Ford on July 25. Elks. vs. Argonauts Toronto Argonauts' Derek Slywka (20) tries to tackle Edmonton Elks' Steven Dunbar Jr. (6) during second half CFL action in Edmonton, on Friday August 15, 2025. (JASON FRANSON/THE CANADIAN PRESS) Elks receiver Steven Dunbar Jr. said Tuesday the chemistry between Fajardo and the offensive unit 'is growing.' 'He's definitely taking charge of the offence,' Dunbar Jr. told media. 'He's taking real good charge of the huddle, communicating to us really well, so it's easy to get your job done when you've got somebody doing that for you.' Edmonton has won its last two games, including last week's win over the Argonauts and a 23-22 victory in the dying seconds the week before in Montreal over the Alouettes. Elks vs. Argonauts Toronto Argonauts' Anthony Lanier II (91) chases Edmonton Elks quarterback Cody Fajardo (7) during first half CFL action in Edmonton, on Friday August 15, 2025. (JASON FRANSON/THE CANADIAN PRESS) Fajardo said getting the running game going, while it's 'never going to win you football games' as the CFL is a three-down, pass-driven league, is important because 'it's going to close out games and it's going to keep you on the field.' 'The fact that we had that kind of performance with running the ball (against the Argos), if we get into some meaningful football games late October, and hopefully into November, we understand we can get it done running the football,' said Fajardo, a nine-year veteran who's spent the bulk of his CFL time in Saskatchewan and Montreal, winning the Grey Cup with the latter squad two years ago. 'Also, we understand if teams take away our running game, we can drop back, and we can throw him the ball and find ways to get him implicated in the game plan.' Elks vs. Argonauts Edmonton Elks' Justin Rankin (5) celebrates a touchdown against the Toronto Argonauts during first half CFL action in Edmonton, on Friday August 15, 2025. (JASON FRANSON/THE CANADIAN PRESS) There's that 'him' being mentioned again, Rankin. Fajardo is a big fan of the 28-year-old arena-league refugee from Ohio who played U.S. college football with Kent State and Northwest Missouri State. 'He's just such a dynamic player,' Fajardo said. 'Football IQ-wise, he's the smartest running back I've ever been around. He's in the quarterback meetings. He's in the receiver meetings. He's listening to their splits, depths, and he's really taking in all the coaching.' Side-lines
CBC
3 minutes ago
- CBC
What to know for a big week in golf
A pair of interesting golf tournaments tee off Thursday as the PGA Tour's FedEx Cup playoffs culminate with the big-money Tour Championship in Atlanta while many of the LPGA's biggest stars (including a 21-year-old British sensation) are in the Toronto area for the Canadian Women's Open. Here's a look at both: Canadian Women's Open Currently branded as the CPKC Women's Open, the lone Canadian stop on the LPGA Tour is taking place at Toronto-adjacent Mississauga Golf and Country Club for the first time in the tournament's 52-year history. Befitting a national open, the field of 156 includes many of the biggest stars in women's golf, including the top four in the world rankings and 19 of the 22 players who have won on the LPGA Tour this season. World No.1 Jeeno Thitikul of Thailand is back in action for the first time since unseating American Nelly Korda for the top spot following the women's British Open, where they both finished well out of contention at the final major championship of the season. Thitikul has one victory on the LPGA Tour this year while Korda is still looking for her first, but with so many different winners this season no one has been able to overtake them. Third-ranked Lydia Ko of New Zealand is after her fourth Canadian Women's Open title and first in a decade. She won Olympic gold in Paris last year, adding to her silver in 2016 and bronze in 2021, and went on to take the women's British Open a few weeks later for her third major title. Australia's Minjee Lee is up to fourth in the rankings after winning the Women's PGA Championship this June for her third major. American Lauren Coughlin returns to defend her title after winning in Calgary last year for her first LPGA Tour victory in her 103rd start. The 32-year-old won again in Scotland a few weeks later and is now ranked 14th in the world. Most importantly, though, the most exciting player in women's golf is here. Twenty-one-year-old English sensation Lottie Woad made headlines last month by winning the European Tour's Women's Irish Open as an amateur, then finishing one shot out of a playoff at the Evian Championship in France, an LPGA major. That convinced Woad to ditch her final year at Florida State University and turn pro, and she immediately won the Women's Scottish Open for her first LPGA Tour title. After tying for eighth at the British Open earlier this month, Woad is the betting favourite to win the Canadian Open. Sixteen Canadians will tee it up in Mississauga, highlighted by 13-time LPGA Tour winner Brooke Henderson and 15-year-old Aphrodite Deng, who last month became the first Canadian to win the prestigious U.S. Girls' Junior championship. Henderson's 13 career titles are the most ever by a Canadian woman or man on a major tour. She owns a pair of majors — the 2016 Women's PGA Championship and the 2022 Evian Championship — and in 2018 she became the first Canadian in 45 years to win the Canadian Women's Open. However, it's now approaching three years since Henderson's last victory, at the season-opening Tournament of Champions in January 2023, and she's cracked the top 10 only once this season, at a match-play event in April. Once ranked as high as second in the world, the 27-year-old from Smiths Falls, Ont. now sits 58th. Still, she remains Canada's top women's golfer by a huge margin. No one else ranks in the top 300. Henderson, who underwent eye surgery during a two-month break last year, has been good off the tee this season, ranking 15th on the tour in strokes gained driving. But she's a brutal 112th on approach shots, forcing her to scramble for par far too often. Here's more on the Canadian Women's Open. Tour Championship An obscene amount of cash is on the line at the PGA Tour's season finale, which tees off Thursday at East Lake in Atlanta. The 30 players remaining in the FedEx Cup playoffs will take home a collective $40 million US, including an eye-watering $10 million for the winner. The runner-up earns $5M, which is more than any of the four majors paid their champion this year, while the third- and fourth-place finishers will each clear the $3.1M that Scottie Scheffler made for winning the British Open. Finishing dead last still gets you a cool $355,000. Two Canadians will be vying for a bigger share of the payday after Corey Conners and Nick Taylor survived the final cutdown by ranking 19th and 25th, respectively, in the season-long points chase following last week's 50-man BMW Championship near Baltimore. Taylor Pendrith just missed out after his 15th-place finish at the BMW inched him up to 33rd. In recent years, Conners and Taylor would have almost no hope of cashing the massive winner's cheque. That's because the Tour Championship used a "starting strokes" format that rewarded the top players with a head start. The points leader began the tournament at 10 under par while the rest of the field slotted in between 8 under for the No. 2 seed and even par for the bottom few guys. Under this system, Conners would have had to make up eight shots on top-ranked Scottie Scheffler while Taylor would start nine shots back. But, after Scheffler cruised to a boring four-shot victory last year, the PGA Tour decided to drop the starting strokes and have everyone begin the Tour Championship on equal footing. This gives each player a fair shot at the title — and hopefully leads to a more dramatic finish. Having said that, Scheffler remains heavily favoured to hoist his second straight FedEx Cup after winning the BMW by two strokes for his fifth title of the year. The British Open and PGA Championship winner has already pocketed close to $24M in official PGA Tour winnings this year, plus a $10M bonus for leading the regular-season points race and another $5M for being the top seed heading into the Tour Championship. Another victory this week would make Scheffler the third player to win multiple FedEx Cups, joining Tiger Woods (who captured the inaugural title in 2007 and added another in 2009) and Rory McIlroy (2016, 2019, 2022). McIlroy, ranked second in the world, has three victories this year but hasn't won since his emotional triumph at the Masters in April to complete the rare career Grand Slam. Here's more on the Tour Championship.
CTV News
10 minutes ago
- CTV News
‘Faster, bigger, stronger': London's Roobroeck brothers eye NHL dreams
Ryan Roobroeck (left) and his brother Dylan are working on and off the ice in London, Ont. in preparation for the upcoming hockey season. (Brent Lale/CTV News London) It's early morning at a small gym in Hyde Park and current and future NHL players are grinding with personal trainers to make necessary gains. 'It's just more speed and cardio and getting ready for this year,' said Ryan Roobroeck, 17, a projected top 10 pick in the 2026 NHL Draft. 'Want to be in the best shape. Then, obviously, you got the NHL combine coming up, so just trying to prepare to get to your full strength, max cardio, and just be in the best shape you possibly can be.' Roobroeck brothers London NHL Ryan Roobroeck lifts weights at Spero Performance in London, Ont. as he trains for the upcoming hockey season. (Brent Lale/CTV News London) Coming off a 41-goal and 87-point season in Niagara, Roobroeck was a late 2007 born player, so he'll go into this draft as an 18-year-old. Alongside the Niagara Ice Dogs phenom is his older brother, Dylan, who played his first professional season a year ago, and NHL veterans Corey Perry and Jared McCann. Dylan is looking like a steal for the New York Rangers, who grabbed him with the 178th pick in the 2023 draft. He scored 20 goals for the AHL's Hartford Wolf Pack a year ago. Roobroeck brothers London NHL Dylan Roobroeck looks for a teammate on the ice while training at Western Fair Sports Centre in London, Ont. (Brent Lale/CTV News London) 'I need to just get bigger and stronger, faster and keep learning,' said Dylan. 'Lower body, like the speed and acceleration and my conditioning. I'm just trying to get better there because you can always improve on those things. The game's all about speed now, so you got to be able to play fast to play up there.' After more than an hour at the gym, the brothers hop in their car and head over to Western Fair Sports Centre, where they get on the ice with former NHL defenceman Danny Syvret, who puts them through the paces. It's the combination of on and off ice work players need to make it to the next level. 'They've got all the skill on the ice, but they've just got to work on their first three steps and get super explosive off the line,' said Mason Mantzavrakos, a trainer at his father's, Spero, gym. Spero, who owns Spero Performance, has been training elite athletes for more than 25 years, and now his son, a former professional player is following in his footsteps. 'We want to make them as strong as possible,' said Mason. 'It's a lot of rotational strength and a lot of plyometrics we do with these guys in here to get them going.' Mason was first introduced to Ryan when he coached him along with Syvret in minor midget. 'He's able to score at any spot on the ice and then I got him in here [the gym] as well, and it's kind of cool because Dylan's the last guy who skated with me when I was playing before I stopped playing. I think he's ready to make the step to the NHL after either this season or next season.' Roobroeck brothers London NHL Dylan Roobroeck lifts weights under the watchful eye of personal trainers at Spero Performance in London, Ont. (Brent Lale/CTV News London) Ryan was selected second overall by Niagara during a time when the franchise was in turmoil. He's stuck it out and had major gains with 13 more goals and 23 more assists than his rookie season. He also won a gold medal with Canada at the 2024 IIHHL World U18 Championships. He'll have dozens of scouts attending every game he plays this season as he enters his draft year. 'It's something that's always on your mind because growing up as a kid, you want to make the next level,' said Ryan. 'This year just kind of do what I can just play my best every single night, give it my all and hope for the best on that draft night.' Both Ryan and Dylan are hoping to make a big leap to the NHL and are pushing each other in the weight room. 'We've been doing that since we were little guys down in our basement,' said Dylan. 'It's always a battle here about who can do better? Who can push more weight? Who is stronger? It's good to have each other here, to push each other.' While they are supporting and rooting for each other, the next competition may be who makes the NHL first.
