CALGARY – Tim McIsaac of Winnipeg, who won 28 medals at the four Paralympic Games between 1976 and 1988 in Para swimming, was announced Thursday among Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame inductees for 2022.
McIsaac was named to the Canadian team that competed at the 1976 Olympiad for the Physically Disabled in Toronto, where he won one gold, two silver and two bronze medals. He also competed at three other Paralympics: Arnhem, Netherlands in 1980 (four gold, one silver, two bronze), New York in 1984 (four gold, three silver) and Seoul in 1988 (six gold, three bronze).
He was named Canada's junior male athlete of the year in 1976 and Manitoba's athlete of year in 1982. McIsaac was inducted into the Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame in 2000, the Canadian Paralympic Hall of Fame in 2013, and Swimming Canada's Circle of Excellence in 2012.
McIsaac was also an innovator in the sport. It was while working with his coaches that McIsaac devised a system where he was tapped on the head or arm and learned to tumble turn like a sighted swimmer. He was the first to execute it in competition and it’s a method now compulsory in competition.
He works as a program coordinator with the Manitoba Civil Service Commission and earned his Master of Education, Counseling Psychology in 2020.
To top off his incredible list of achievements, McIsaac was the first blind student to graduate from the University of Winnipeg.
He will be officially inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame in October.
