Mountain biker Gunnar Holmgren captures Canada's 1st Pan Am gold medal in Chile

Gunnar Holmgren of Orillia, Ont., has a Pan Am gold medal to add to his Canadian titles in mountain biking.

The 24-year-old earned Canada's first podium finish in Santiago, Chile, beating Chilean Martin Vidaurre Kossmann and Brazil's Jose Gabriel Marques De Almeida to the finish line in one hour 17 minutes 59 seconds. Vidaurre Kossmann was 53 seconds behind.

Holmgren moved into the lead on the third of seven laps and held it on the course at the Catholic University Sports Club northeast of the city.

Holmgren is part of the first family of Canadian mountain biking: mother Lisa was an elite racer, father Rob is a coach, sister Isabella is 2023 XCO and XC junior world champion and her twin sister Ava is also a regular fixture on the medal podium.

Ranked 34th in the world, Gunnar recently completed his strongest World Cup season, featuring several top-15 finishes in XCC, which consists of a 1 to 1.5-kilometre circuit course. He was also second at the Pan Am Continental Championships in the XCO and third in the XCC.

The XCO is short for cross-country Olympics and an off-road mountain bike race format held over undulating, mainly dirt-based circuits that riders complete several times.

In April, Holmgren picked up three medals at the Pan American Mountain Bike Championships in Brazil, including gold in team relay as Canada's elite male entry.

"My goal is to go to the Olympics and bring home a medal for Canada," he told OrilliaMatters in May.

He has spent the year focused on cycling and working on his coaching accreditation while helping train, mentor and lead more than 25 young, high-performance cyclists across the country.

Orillia's 2021 athlete of the year began mountain biking at age 5. He joined Quebec-based Pivot Cycles in 2020 and has picked up a pair of top-10 finishes in the U23 division and four, top-30 elite results at the World Cup level.