2-time Olympic champ Rosie MacLennan retiring from competition, aims to stay a voice for athletes | CBC Sports

Rosie Maclennan shows up at the CBC Sports offices for our interview unaccompanied and without fanfare.

“I’m a little bit early,” she says in a text message. “Don’t rush though, I’m happy to do a little reading until you’re ready for me.”

The two-time Olympic trampoline champion has arrived to reflect on her career and talk about why she’s decided that now is the time to retire from competitive sport. 

MacLennan, 34, has also just returned from the world championships in Sofia, Bulgaria where she is the athlete representative on the International Gymnastics Federation [FIG]. From here, she’ll head back to Stanford University in California in order to complete her studies toward an MBA.

There’s a lot to consider when you try to measure up everything this diminutive, yet powerful, woman has done and continues to do. 

Rosie, as most affectionately refer to her, has been flying through the stratosphere and, at times, under the radar on the Canadian sporting landscape for a long time. 

WATCH | Scott Russell sits down with Rosie Maclennan:

2-time Olympic champion Rosie MacLennan announces retirement

Rosie MacLennan, a two-time Olympic champion in trampoline, sits down with Scott Russell to reflect on her career and the next chapter.

She’s that rare athlete who has competed at four Olympic Games. MacLennan also carried the Canadian flag at the opening ceremony of Rio 2016, and successfully defended the gold medal she won in London four years earlier. 

That made her the first and only Canadian at a Summer Games to repeat as Olympic champion in an individual event.  Beyond that she’s won 18 major international titles, been the individual trampoline world champion twice, and the Pan American Games gold medallist on two occasions, including at home in Toronto in 2015.

“I think that is always going to go down in history as one of my favourite memories,” she said. “It’s because I finally got to perform in front of a home crowd and in front of people who never really had the opportunity of watching me compete. Also winning a medal and standing alongside my role model, [three-time Olympic medallist)] Karen Cockburn, was a dream come true.” 

MacLennan’s credentials as an athlete are unassailable. Her record in her sport is incomparable, certainly from a Canadian perspective.

“Of all the champions I have coached Rosie is perhaps the greatest,” said Dave Ross, her longtime coach and mentor. “Rosie brought incredible determination with a positive outlook and a sunny personality. To her a setback was just another challenge that she would overcome.”

And there have been multiple setbacks along the way. Concussion issues in the lead-up to Toronto 2015, broken ankles and torn tendons on the way to the Tokyo Olympics. But somehow, MacLennan managed to overcome everything to remain the constant contender throughout her exemplary career. 

“There is a phenomenal and admirable mental toughness in most top athletes that some call true grit,” Ross said. “And in Rosie’s case there was no dark side to the force. She wanted all her competitors to do their best, while doing the work and taking the risks to surpass them. 

In Rosie’s case there was no dark side to the force. She wanted all her competitors to do their best, while doing the work and taking the risks to surpass them– Dave Ross, MacLennan’s longtime coach

“That extra, rare, mental outlook is a common factor in the greatest athletes. However, some can get Machiavellian during their quest. Rosie worked on raising up, not pushing her opponents down.”

This unique quality of caring for the common good of athletes is an important and distinguishing characteristic of MacLennan’s, and continues to drive her forward now that her competitive days are over.

“In some ways I don’t feel like it’s a retirement from sport,” she said. “I realize that I can still benefit from sport and in fact, benefit sport in other ways than playing it. It’s just a change in the way I show up.”

Over the course of her journey, MacLennan has expertly juggled academics and advocacy along with athletics and done it in an understated way, not to mention with tremendous effectiveness.

“She has the maturity and wisdom of leaders twice her age,” said Dr. Bruce Kidd, an Olympian and one of MacLennan’s thesis advisors for her graduate degree in Exercise Science at the University of Toronto. 

“She brings a humanitarian and sports-based framework to everything she does, and she consults and listens. As chair of the Canadian Olympic Committee’s Athlete’s Council, it was her leadership at the beginning of the pandemic to put public health and safety above all else.”

Leadership must come from athletes

The president of the Canadian Olympic Committee, four-time Olympic rower Tricia Smith, directs attention not only to MacLennan’s performance record but goes further and calls her a model of integrity.

“This is a young woman who cares about people, cares about the athletes she so ably represents, and cares about leaving things better than she found them,” Smith said. “And not just small things, big things like human rights and inclusion and access. I have nothing but respect for Rosie MacLennan.”

Leadership is important to MacLennan. 

Increasingly she believes the source of that leadership in the Canadian sports system must come from the athletes themselves. For lack of a better explanation, she says she hopes that athletes continue to “step up” and she’s working toward that in her role as head of the COC’s Athlete’s Council.

“Sport has the potential to help youth and adolescents develop as human beings,” she said. “I was valued for more than my skills as a trampoline athlete. What I thought counted. Athletes need to be more than just performers. Anything less than having athletes as equal partners is not a sustainable sports system.”

MacLennan lists as personal heroes her teammate Cockburn, and her late grandfather Lorne Patterson, a gymnast who was denied a chance to compete at the 1940 Olympics because of the outbreak of the Second World War.

She also points to hockey great Hayley Wickenheiser, not only because of her prowess on the ice, but more importantly, because of the influence she’s had over others while off it. 

‘Place of passion’

“She’s been a trailblazer her entire career,” MacLennan said of Wickenheiser. “She’s really been a strong advocate and proponent. She’s had an ability to transcend the field of play and have an impact on broader society.”

MacLennan has already lived up to those ideals and found the time to be an example to all Canadians at every level of the games we all play.

“She understands how sport gives us all an opportunity to be the best version of ourselves,” said Dr. Marco Di Buono, president of Canadian Tire Jumpstart Charities. “Through her work with Jumpstart and others, she fought to remove barriers to participation every chance she had.

“Rosie never failed to help us in our mission to support kids in need across Canada, even during the pandemic when she helped us deliver virtual programming to thousands of children. Even while she was preparing to represent Canada, she found time to help us and serve as a role model and inspiration for countless children and youth across the country.” 

Champions are often remembered for the spectacular games or glittering medals they’ve won. In many ways, the size of the trophy case — and what’s in it — seems to matter to many people.

But now, as MacLennan graciously takes her leave, there are other contributions that carry more weight. 

“I think I’d love to be remembered for how I approach sport,” she said. “From a place of passion, and love for what I did and for trying to build a community of athletes. I’m hoping that my legacy doesn’t end here. I’m hoping to be able to continue working in this space and to have impact.”

There is little doubt she will do just that. 

Even in retirement, Rosie MacLennan has all the ability in the world to rise above the rest.