She couldn’t do it. Both already knew by the time the Canadian Olympic Committee gathered to announce their choice Sunday.
“Do they even know yet?” Mark Tewksbury, Canada's Chef de Mission asked.
“She was not allowed to tell her teammates,” added assistant Chef de Misson Sylvie Bernier.
Sinclair turned as red as the Canada jacket she was wearing, “oh,” she said.
The room erupted in laughter.
“They wanted to know where I was going and all of a sudden I’m leaving dressed like this and they’re like ‘where are you going?’ You’re not going to McDonald’s like that,” the women’s soccer captain explained like a teenager caught breaking curfew.
“Okay, okay we’ll reprimand you later,” Tewksbury laughed.
And then another confession.
“I cried. And I broke another rule and I called my mom. My mom doesn’t know how to use Twitter, it’s okay.”
She appeared to be forgiven. Tewksbury got up from the press conference head table and gave her a hug.
“It was a magical moment,” said a teary-eyed Tewksbury, recalling the moment he told Sinclair.
By Sunday morning, the final day of the 2012 Games, Canada was sitting with 18 medals, one gold and in the running to hit its goal of a top-12 finish by day’s end.
At the final Canadian Olympic Committee press conference of these Games, Tewksbury, an Olympic gold medallist himself, said it was the most memorable of his career.
He rhymed off some of the highlights: Trampolinist Rosie MacLellan’s golden performance. Diver Emilie Heymans, who made history winning four medals in four straight games. The “darkhorse” medallists, like Derek Drouin who shocked with his bronze in high jump and Antoine Valois-Fortier’s third place finish in Judo. And of course, the women’s soccer bronze medal — the first team medal for Canada at a summer Games since 1936.
Sinclair was again asked about a heartbreaking semi-final loss to the United States. She touched on earlier comments from Tewksbury about another tragic loss for Canada in London — the men’s relay team losing bronze on a disqualification. “We can’t escape that sport is brutal sometimes.”
It sums up how Sinclair feels about her Olympic ups and downs. The 29-year-old explained that Canada dominated the “best team in the world” in the semi-final — a game where she scored three goals — and lost when they shouldn’t have. But against France, her opponents were hitting “posts and crossbars” and “should have won that game and we won.”
It was a ride that captivated Canadians. Women’s soccer has in many ways been the performance of the Games and Sinclair was the favourite to carry the Maple Leaf at the closing ceremonies Sunday night. Following the bronze medal game, there was a Twitter campaign with the hashtag #SinclairForFlagBearer.
In the end, Tewksbury said she exemplified the five goal-characteristics of Team Canada: proud, world class, fierce, relentless and unbreakable.
“This is by far the greatest honour I've ever had in my athletic career.”
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