(Al Bello/Getty Images/Leah Hennel/COC)

By Alessia Proietti

Santiago, Chile

Red Deer BMXer Molly Simpson wins silver medal at first Pan American Games

Oct 25, 2023 | 2:39 PM

Local world champion BMX racer Molly Simpson has now added a Pan American Games medal to her belt.

The 20-year-old Red Deerian just returned home with a silver medal after spending a week in Santiago, Chile for her first ever major Games competition.

The Pan American Games are the largest multidisciplinary international sporting event for athletes from across the Americas, held every four years and the year before the Olympic Games. The 2023 competition attracted 7,000 athletes from 41 countries participating in 39 sports.

On Saturday, October 21, Simpson slotted into third place in the time trial with 35.880 seconds, just .730 seconds behind the number one time from Columbian athlete Mariana Pajòn Londoño.

With trial times less than a second apart between the top three athletes, competition was fierce for the following day.

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“We were all so tight on the time trial and then the second day rolled around and I just felt good. I had a decent start in the final and then slotted myself into second and was able to hold that around the whole track and it was just an unreal feeling to cross the line and realize that I just medaled at my first Games which is basically like a mini-Olympics,” she said, describing the win as one of her best career results yet.

Simpson walked away with a heavy silver medal for second place, with a time of exactly 36 seconds. Pajòn Londoño earned first place with 34.4 seconds.

Her biggest challenge throughout the competition, she says, was staying focused.

“It was very distracting; the crowd and all the countries there and the athletes. You could just tell it was a different event; it wasn’t your classic World Cup or National Championship, it was a Games, and you could feel it,” she said.

“I think everybody was a bit more on edge, so the racing was definitely a bit harder and you had to stay calm and just race your race and do your best lap.”

Her strategy, she says, was to focus only on the things that she could control and putting herself in the moment.

“I would kind of catch myself saying,’ oh I could podium’ or ‘maybe I could even win this’ and then I would tell myself, ‘I can’t think about that right know; I just got to think about what’s right in front of me’. Whether I’d be sitting in a chair or warming up, that’s all I had to focus on. Drinking my water, relaxing, cooling down and warming up and then getting in the gate and then it was go time after that,” she said.

She says the most memorable part of the journey was the opening ceremonies, walking into the large stadium in her uniform after hearing her country’s name, with everyone cheering and performers dancing.

“We’re all just supporting Canada and representing our country and I think that was the coolest thing, knowing that I was here with 400 other athletes, and we were just representing the same thing, and doing the same thing, and wanting to achieve the same thing and it was just a big team,” she said.

Now back in Red Deer for two weeks, one of her longest rest periods at home, she says she is excited to relax and decompress with her family and friends, who have been the motivation and backbone to her work, alongside her coaches.

She will have one more competition at the USA BMX Grand Nationals in Tulsa, Oklahoma this November where she will focus on her training before prepping for next year during her off-season.

READ: World champion BMXer from Red Deer, Molly Simpson, accepts Mayor’s Recognition Award