Melissa Bishop fills us in on World Champs, her wedding and racing next summer in Toronto

This week, we got a chance to sit down and talk to 800m pro Melissa Bishop at a rooftop downtown Toronto. The middle distance athlete was in the big city for the announcement of a track event slated for next summer: Toronto 2018: Track & Field in the 6ix. Hosted by Athletics Canada, this meet will take place on Aug. 10-12 will be the sight for the NACAC championships. Bishop plans on being there. 

RELATED: Toronto announced major 2018 track meet

“Being able to be in Ontario and in Canada and having your family, friends and fans come to watch is unlike anything else. When I won gold in 2015 in Toronto at Pan Am Games… I wish people could feel that feeling. The feeling of crossing the line and knowing that there’s thousands of people screaming for you, that’s a feeling that you cannot compare to anything else,” she said. 

But Track & Field in the 6ix is not all we talked about. 

As track fans know, Bishop represented Canada in the World Championships this summer in London. She placed fifth in a highly competitive field of runners. It has been a time of major milestones for the runner: she got engaged before Rio, ran at the Olympics, ran at World Championships this summer and has just recently been married to Osi, her boyfriend from university. 

When asked about her performance in London, Bishop doesn’t mince words. 

“I wouldn’t say it went the way I wanted it go to, no. I was expecting to be on the podium for sure,” she says. That said, because she immediately jumped into wedding plans (she got married over Thanksgiving weekend) she felt that her big day became a distraction from her World Championship disappointment.

“I don’t hurt like I did in Rio, I’ll put it that way,” she says. “It wasn’t the heartbreak that Rio was.”