World champion shot putter Sarah Mitton on handling disappointment and embracing joy in sport

Two-time Olympian Sarah Mitton is one of the athletes who has, in recent years, helped put Canada on the map as a “Big Throws Nation.” 

The 28-year-old from Liverpool, Nova Scotia is the back-to-back indoor world champion in women’s shot put in 2024 and 2025. Mitton was a silver medallist outdoors at the 2023 World Athletics Championships and also has gold medals at the Pan Am Games (2023) and Commonwealth Games (2022) to her name.

Mitton has been rewriting the Canadian record books in the event and went into the Paris 2024 Olympic Games as a gold medal favourite. Olympic.ca caught up with Mitton to chat about her tough Olympic experience last summer, resilience in sport, and the joy she finds in representing Canada.

Congratulations on repeating as indoor world champion! What was that experience like?

In track and field when you’re the defending champion or the world leader, you get a different colored bib. This was the first time that I’ve ever had to wear that. 

I’m so used to being the underdog in the event over the last couple years. There’s always been a chance that I could win the gold medal, but I’d kind of come out in the wash of 2-3-4. 

It was a neat moment for me, personally, getting that bib handed to me the night before and being like, “Whoa, this is happening. Tomorrow you could make history for yourself and really put yourself into the history books of the women’s shot put.” 

It actually kind of took the pressure off, in a way! When you put it on, it’s a bit of a moment and then you’re like, “Wow, it’s pretty cool to even have the opportunity to do that.”

So it felt different heading into the meet as the defending champion?

Paris was the first time that I was walking into a stadium where the eyes were on me as someone who was very likely to win a gold medal that day, or be on the podium. 

That was obviously an immense amount of pressure. But the pressure matched my goals, so it wasn’t as overbearing as you would think. 

I walked into Paris so confident. I had a little bit of swagger! I had the best training I’d had, the best everything. It’s the Olympic Games, you come in at the best that you can and I was just in that perfect position. 

Coming into the indoor world championships, I’d had a pretty good indoor season; one really great meet, and then some meets that were a little bit off, and I’d been making some changes. 

I didn’t walk in the same way, that’s for sure. It was almost the opposite; I had a bit of hesitancy. I realized—even though you’re the defending champion, you still have to work so hard, especially in an event that is on the up and coming. There’s five girls on any given day who can kind of take that spot from you.

So, I definitely walked in with a fighter mentality, ready to work, and I think that contributed to actually being able to defend my title.

Since you brought up Paris—I think your story at the Games is an important one to tell, where you were so well prepared, and things still didn’t go your way. And as much as we all love a triumphant story, this one is inherently a sporting story as well. What have you learned about yourself throughout the past year?

Like you said, it is inherently sport, as much as you want to tell the story of the person who was so ready to capitalize and they win the gold medal in this beautiful “tied up in a bow” situation. 

The other side is, how fun were [the Games] for the other people, who were able to have the storyline of being the person who overcame or who had their best day?

But, to explain, for the Olympic Games everything was trending in the right direction. I was in the best shape of my life. Things were going really well. 

Unfortunately, two months prior, I ended up losing my father. So that threw a huge wrench into the preparations, despite there being an inkling and preparation, honestly, leading into the Games of “what will we do if X occurs?” There’s so much stuff that goes into planning for an Olympics, and sadly, part of my preparation was asking: “what will we do if that happens?” 

I’m super proud that I was able to continue to compete and train at such an elite level, despite all the chaos in my life at the time. I didn’t bring that to the forefront leading into the Games because it’s not something that I think I was really able to speak on [at the time] and not something that I really wanted to be the storyline of my Games, nor would my father have wanted that. But I know that he would have wanted me to go out there no matter what. 

On the qualification day, it’s a beautiful sunny day. Everything’s perfect. Not a snag in the world, everything unfolds according to plan. In my head, I was like, “This is great. This is just what I needed.” And then the next day is the final. It’s my first time qualifying for the [Olympic] final. I’m feeling really good again. Still feeling extremely confident. We get to the stadium. I’m fighting off a few things that day that were just little nags, but when you’re in such good shape that you’re not so worried.

And then by the time I get into the stadium, it starts to rain. I’ve worked so hard on my mental performance to be able to handle the pressure of competition and, in hindsight, I think it’s easy to see that, emotionally, I wasn’t able to handle a situation that I feel like I should have been able to handle, given the calibre of athlete that I think I am. I just kind of crumbled a little bit in this situation. The circle was pretty slippery, we had women going down—the Olympic champion actually wiped out on her first attempt.

I just did the best that I could but I didn’t get it together soon enough. My last throw, my last attempt in the final, I threw what probably would have won the Olympics and I fouled it. But I had to go for it. 

When you’re competing for an Olympic gold medal the margin of error is so incredibly small and I was just so fortunate to be able to be out there that day trying to do that. I was in exactly the right position to do it and it still didn’t unfold for me. And that’s okay. 

I’ve dealt with disappointment before from an Olympic Games and I think I was very well equipped to handle it this time. And the rebound for me was very strong [to come back and win the Diamond League title post-Games] and I think that that comes from all of that experience of everything that’s kind of transpired over the last three years.

There can be a tendency to think of athletes as solely athletes, where all they do is train and there’s nothing else, no external factors that exist in their life. Your story is a really important reminder that no athlete exists in a sporting vacuum.

But to return to a focus on something sport-specific—word around the throwing circle is that you’ve made some changes to your throwing technique. Can you talk me through from a layperson’s perspective?

It was something that my coach and I kept kind of a secret from October untiI January when I started competing. To someone who’s not a shot put expert, you probably aren’t going to notice a huge difference. You might, if you’re watching me, think, “Oh, [her technique] is a little different than the other girls.” But everyone has their own personal style and flair.

The technical change that we’ve made is right at the back of the throw where I start. Instead of starting with both of my feet parallel to the back of the circle, so I’m fully reversed, I’ve actually taken my right foot 30° or 40° further in rotation.

So, I’m actually starting more towards the right of the circle with my right foot further back. The idea behind it is that it creates a longer pathway for the shot put because it starts a little further back. You have a little bit longer to apply force on the ball. 

We have lots and lots of physics equations and lots and lots of physics chats at practices. Even though I took high school physics and university physics, I never thought I would ever use it again! But here we are talking about angular momentum and creating velocity and force across the circle. 

What we’re seeing is that just that little extra quarter turn is really accelerating the shot put in a way that I don’t have to work so hard. It’s a small subtle change for outsiders, but when you’re the one inside it, it feels so incredibly different. It’s about six months into it now and it’s starting to feel really good.

I did not take physics even in high school so I will take your word on everything you just said! When will we see it in action during the upcoming outdoor season? What are the goals for this year?

I’m starting my outdoor season in April and ending in September, so it’s pretty much jam packed with excitement.

I have my sights set on winning the world championship gold medal outdoors as well. I just think that that’s a bit of a snazzier win than the indoor one. I have this little joke that I have a gold medal from everything so far, except for the world championship outdoors and the Olympic Games. So, I’ll retire when I get them! I’m not sure that’s entirely true, but that’s a really big part of my motivation now. It would be really neat to be able to acquire one from everything. 

Apart from that, the 21-metre barrier is definitely something that I think a few of us have our sights on. But I’m hoping that I’m the first one there, and I think that the new [technique] change will really help accelerate that process.

Is there anything that you wish more people knew about shot put?

That is a tough question. Most of the time when I meet someone, I think they assume the shot put is lighter because 4 kilos doesn’t sound very heavy. Then they pick it up and I usually get a little bit more respect [chuckles].

I think the coolest part about that is, we are obviously very strong and the shot put is heavy, but I think it’s becoming so much more of a speed event. Shot put is so much speed/power. It’s about harnessing speed and power in such a small period of time. It’s similar to if you were to condense a 100m down to just the start.

I think there’s a bias to think that we’re just these like super duper strong human beings, but a lot of our focus is on the speed of the shot put on release. When we train we do sprints, we do jumps, we do anything that’s going to increase that explosive power. We do lift a lot, but it’s twofold.

What does it mean to you to compete for Team Canada?

It’s always been the dream. 

I remember sitting in my living room watching the Olympic Games, my two really close friends were with me at the time. We were watching Valerie Adams [two-time Olympic champion from New Zealand] and the shot put final, I think it was for 2016, so not even that long ago.

I remember sitting there, having been an athlete my whole life, thinking: “Wow. That would be so incredible to go out there and represent your country in a sport that you love.” 

The feeling that I got watching that Olympic Games—for me that’s what’s really important—is that the people at home get to experience your story along with you.

As silly as it is, all I do is throw this little metal ball, but I also know that it’s so much more than that. Being able to bring that kind of joy into people’s lives that I experienced watching the Olympics as a kid while thinking that I would never be in that position, as a small kid coming out of a small province. 

And now in retrospect, being able to do that and have so many people be a part of my team and so many people be a part of my journey from my hometown and from all across these little pockets of Canada. I’m just really grateful to have been able to bring everyone along for the ride and hopefully fill them with some level of joy and positivity at some point.

And I felt almost like I reached more people [this summer] than I probably would have if I won a gold medal and everything was gold and chipper and rainbows and sunshine. I just had so many more people, I think, relate to my experience. I’m not saying that that’s the way I wanted it to go, but I’m super grateful that there was more to get out of it than just that.