It was go-time for Okotoks Olympian Finlay Knox this morning.

The 20-year-old competed in the men's 200m individual medley in Tokyo at the 2020 Olympic Games.

Knox recorded a time of 1:58.29, placing 6th in heat four, and 17th overall.

He was just a hair away from Japan's Daiya Seto, who finished at 1:58.15, putting Knox just out of reach of the semifinals, which takes the top 16 qualifiers from the six heats.

Knox wasn't far behind his personal best of 1:58.07, set at the Olympic Swimming Trials in June.

In Okotoks, locals gathered at the cafe 94 Take the Cake bright and early at 5 a.m. for a watch party.

 

Among them was Jotham d'Ailly, who swam with Finlay for about nine years with the Okotoks Mavericks Swim Club.

"It's really cool, just having swam with him for so long. It's really cool to see someone from Okotoks make it out to Tokyo... He's still young so he still has a few more Olympics in him, so it'll be exciting to see him at the next one for sure."

The cafe is recognizing three local Olympians including Knox, High River's Kyra Christmas, and Vulcan's Keyara Wardley with cookies baring the image of each athlete.

Christmas, along with the rest of Canada's women's water polo squad, played South Africa just a few hours earlier, with Canada taking a 21-1 victory. They face the Netherlands on Sunday, August 1 at 12:30 a.m. (Mountian Time).

Keyara Wardley is on Canada's women's rugby sevens team, which will be facing Brazil this evening (July 28) at 6:30 p.m.

 

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