Low and Tardif lead Canada’s Mission staff to Beijing

By Rachal Fleury

Behind every team of Canadian athletes at a Paralympic Games is a team of dedicated individuals known as the “Mission staff.”  These volunteers donate their time with one common goal in mind: to ensure Canadian athletes have the best possible experience at the Paralympic Games, both in and out of competition.

Approximately 120 Mission staff, including coaches, medical staff, team services officers and a media team, will accompany Canada’s 151 athletes (including eight guides) to the 2008 Paralympic Summer Games in Beijing from September 6-17.

At the helm of the Missionstaff are Chef de Mission Debbie Low and Assistant Chef de Mission Gaetan Tardif.

Chef de Mission Debbie Low

Low has been on the Canadian Paralympic Committee’s Missionstaff at nine Games and was Assistant Chef de Mission at the Athens Paralympic Games in 2004.

She has been involved in amateur sport for 20 years and is currently president and CEO of the Canadian Sport Centre Ontario. Previously, she served as executive director of Paralympics Ontario, and as director of sport for Toronto’s 2008 Olympic and Paralympic bid.

Low was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario, and is the mother of two teenage girls.

Assistant Chef de Mission Gaetan Tardif

Tardif is participating in his fifth Paralympic Games as a member of Canada’s Mission staff. He was a team doctor in Sydney and Athens, chief medical officer in Salt Lake Cityand Torino, and is now Assistant Chef de Mission for Beijing. He has also been named Assistant Chef de Mission for the 2010 Paralympic Games in Vancouver.

Tardif was born in Chicoutimi, Quebec. He attended medical school at the University of Laval and continued his education at the University of Ottawa (U of O), where he specialized in rehabilitation and sports medicine. He went on to work at the Ottawa rehab hospital and opened the U of O sports medicine clinic before moving to Toronto in 1998 to head up that city’s rehab hospital (which had merged from four hospitals into one). He is currently vice president of Patient Care and chief medical officer at Toronto Rehab.

Tardif lives in Toronto with his wife, who is also a doctor, and their two children. As Chef and Assistant Chef de Mission, Low and Tardif have made several trips to Beijing ahead of the Games and are impressed with the breath-taking venues and ahead-of-schedule preparations.

“Beijing 2008 will be an important part of Paralympic Games history, with many firsts and many triumphs to be had,” said Low.

Tardiff added, “Beijing is as well organized as any Games I have ever seen and is as well prepared as any Games I have ever seen. Torino started landscaping their Games venues after the Games ended. Beijing started landscaping (two months) ago!”

Their Beijingvisits haven’t been all business though, and both Low and Tardif have staked their claims to fame in the Chinese capital. Low had a brush with stardom when she squeezed herself into a picture with Jackie Chan at a Games rally (he had his arm around her shoulder) and Tardif has been known to cut a mean deal in the silk market.

With less then two months to go until the Games get underway, Low and Tardif are very excited about their upcoming time in Beijing. However, they are also a bit apprehensive about missing a major milestone back home while they are gone, as both their first-borns will be heading off to university for the first time.

But despite what’s happening at home, Low and Tardif are focused on the job they have to do and on doing it well. Tardif is anticipating not only a good showing from Canadian athletes, but from the Canadian Mission staff as well.

“I’m looking forward to the excitement of watching the athletes do well, but am equally as proud to bring together this group of volunteers and watch them work well as a team,” he said. “This Mission staff has good chemistry. We’re very cohesive and work well together.”

For Low, the Games will be a culmination of a lot of time and hard work.

“By the time I get to the Games I will have been working on them for two years,” Low said. “The journey to Beijing 2008 has been about physical, mental and spiritual preparation. It has been about making sacrifices and training hard, and now it’s time for all the hard work to pay off.”

Low, Tardif and the rest of the Mission staff leave for Beijing at the end of August.