100 days from the Olympics, federal funding question looms over Canadian athletes

Canadian athletes enter the home stretch of preparation for the 2026 Winter Games that start in 100 days, but they’ll soon learn whether the organizations that support them can continue to do so.

With the federal budget to be tabled Tuesday, the Canadian Olympic and Paralympic committees have asked Ottawa for a $144-million increase in core funding, which they say hasn’t increased in two decades.

“The impact of the lack of funding keeps mounting,” Canadian Olympic Committee chief executive officer David Shoemaker said Wednesday. “It shifts the burden increasingly to athletes.”

NSOs count on core funding to pay for operations, athletes, coaches and support staff. Freestyle Canada’s CEO Peter Judge has called it the “blood in the veins” of his organization.

Several winter-sport leaders told The Canadian Press in February they were running deficits, increasing team fees that athletes pay, or cutting back on competitions, training camps and travel because inflation has weakened their spending power.

Basketball Canada’s CEO questioned last year whether the organization could attract NBA stars to represent the country in future Olympic Games if coaching staff, training camps or pre-competition resources were compromised.

There’s been an uptick in lobbying for the increase with bus stop signs and billboards around Parliament Hill stating “We are all Team Canada. Invest in Sport. Invest in Canada.”

Olympic champion rower and Canadian senator Marnie McBean questioned Heritage Minister Steven Guilbeault in the Senate chamber Sept. 25, asking if the government would increase core funding “and commit to developing a reliable long-term funding strategy for sport in Canada?”

Decorated Canadian sprinter Andre De Grasse and Shoemaker met with Prime Minister Mark Carney in Ottawa for a photo op on Oct. 9, the same day De Grasse was lauded in the Senate.

Whether that adds up to a core-funding increase on Tuesday, Secretary of Sport Adam van Koeverden was noncommittal.

“I won’t speak to a budget which has not been announced just yet,” Van Koeverden said. “I will say that I will always fight for more money for athletes and the sports system because I believe that the sports system continues to be one of Canada’s greatest nation-building projects.”

The Future of Sport in Canada Commission’s preliminary report in August stated that Canada’s sport system is severely underfunded.

“National Sport Organizations today are expected to be leaders in their sport but also to create safe sport environments, promote diversity and inclusion and strengthen their governance practices, among many other responsibilities,” the report said. “Yet, they operate with static or even diminishing funding levels that have not kept pace with inflation nor reflected increasing expectations over the past two decades.

“There is an urgent need for an injection of funds to ensure that National Sport Organizations can continue operating. This need is especially pressing for winter sports, given the upcoming Olympics and Paralympics Winter Games in 2026.”

Athletes received an increase in their monthly Athletes Assistance Program cheques, otherwise known as “carding,” in the 2024 budget.

A senior athlete saw a bump from $1,765 per month to $2,175 in their first raise since 2017. NSO leaders have said the increase is eaten up by the rise in team fees to cover costs the organization can no longer afford.

The COC and CPC initially asked for a $104-million increase in core funding in the 2024 budget. The ask increased for 2025.

“It’s hard to ballpark where my level of confidence is for next Tuesday’s announcement, but my level of confidence in this Prime Minister, in Mark Carney, my level of confidence in this Minister of Sport, Adam van Koeverden, is very high that they understand the value of sport,” Shoemaker said.

The 2026 Winter Olympics run Feb. 6-22 in Milan and Cortina, Italy, followed by the Paralympic Games there March 6-15.

Canadians won 26 medals — four gold, eight silver and 14 bronze — to rank fourth in the overall medal table in Beijing in 2022.

Canada’s Paralympians earned 25 medals, including eight gold, to rank third in Beijing.

The 2026 Olympic team’s chef de mission, Jennifer Heil, will return to Italy for the first time since winning moguls gold at the 2006 Games in Turin.

The 42-year-old from Spruce Grove, Alta., says she was a beneficiary of robust funding during her athletic career.

“Canada did a really good job of that in about 2005 to 2016,” she said. “Then costs started to get away like they do for everyone. Inflation, the lower Canadian dollar, the teams spend most of their year outside of Canada, it’s unsustainable, and yet the athletes continue to rise.

“We’re going to have one of our best teams that we’ve ever had, but the reality is that if we want to see the success, if we want to celebrate Canada in this way on the global stage, we have to invest.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 29, 2025.

Donna Spencer, The Canadian Press