After step forward in Paris, Canadian gymnast Félix Dolci looks for leap in L.A.
CBC
The Paris Olympics ended less than two months ago, but Canadian gymnast Félix Dolci is already thinking about Los Angeles 2028.
"L.A. was already in my mind before I even showed up in Paris, to be honest with you," Dolci said in an interview on Monday.
Dolci, 22, from Laval, Que., was a member of the first Canadian men's gymnastics team to compete at an Olympics since 2008 when he suited up in Paris. The five-man squad qualified for the team final, placing eighth. Dolci also advanced in the men's all-around, where he slotted 20th.
Yet while the experience — specifically making the team final — was viewed as a success, it only whet Dolci's appetite for more.
"I want to be a world champion in the near future before the next Olympics," he said. "And like I said, every single year will go by, more titles will be achieved. And once we show up back in L.A., we'll be looking for a medal, that's for sure. That's the goal."
As a new four-year cycle begins for summer Olympians, optimism will surely rule the day. But there's reason to believe the Canadian's goals are realistic.
Dolci, who last year became the first Canadian to win a Pan Am Games gymnastics gold medal in 60 years, took one week off after Paris before vaulting back into training.
WATCH | Dolci wins Pan Am gold:
He'll have his first crack at accomplishing his goal of becoming world champion next October when the biannual competition heads to Jakarta, Indonesia — and he'll have that Olympic experience in his back pocket.
"I feel like after everything that happened — the good, the bad — the learning process was tremendous, was very, very big. And I was able to kind of come out of these Games as a better athlete and also a better individual," Dolci said.
Curtis Hibbert, the first Canadian man to ever win a world-championship medal, compared Dolci to Philip Delesalle, the Canadian who competed at the 1976 Olympics and won two gold medals at the Commonwealth Games two years later.
"That was probably, I think, our strongest gymnast ever and he placed almost top three at world championships, so we don't have that athlete come along very often and to have [Dolci] come out the way he's performing, definitely he has the opportunity," Hibbert said.
In Paris, an equipment malfunction may have prevented Dolci from reaching his full potential.
During the high-bar rotation of the individual all-around competition, the Canadian's grip broke, sending him flying to the mat in a heap after an attempted trick.
