By 1977 Barb Olmsted was a member of the Canadian national canoeing team and won the junior K4-500 event at the North American Championships. Due to Canada’s boycott of the 1980 Summer Olympics, however, she would have to wait until 1984 to represent Canada in that tournament. At the 1984 Canadian Championships she took three titles, the K1, K2, and K4-500, and was selected for the Games, where she earned bronze in the K4-500 alongside Alexandra Barré, Lucie Guay, and Sue Holloway. The team was shaken up for the 1985 World Championships, with Olmsted and Barré joining the former’s sister Nancy and the non-Olympian Erika Revesz for a sixth place finish. The Olmsted sisters, with Caroline Brunet and Sheila Taylor, would eventually make the 1988 Summer Olympics, where they were eliminated in the opening round of the K4-500 and did not qualify for the finals during the repêchage. Barb and Taylor also competed in the K2-500, where they finished eighth, and the former retired shortly after the Games. She earned a bachelor’s degree in physical education from Queen’s University, a master’s degree from the University of Western Ontario, and a doctorate of education from West Virginia University and now works as a professor at Nipissing University in North Bay, Ontario.
Canada