McIntosh ready for teenage fun after Olympic glory

PARIS – The only swimming Summer McIntosh’s mom expects her daughter to do in the immediate future is in Lake Muskoka after a cannonball off the dock

“Summer’s a free spirit,” Jill Horstead said Monday in Paris. “Don’t be fooled by her focus. She’s very good at switching gears. As soon as she gets home, it’s going to be full-on teenager having fun.”

McIntosh, whose first name was inspired by the character Summer Roberts on the television show “The O.C.”, has earned a measure of leisure after capturing three gold medals and a silver in the Olympic pool in Paris.

She’s Canada’s first triple gold medallist at an Olympic Games, winter or summer. The Toronto swimmer joins teammate Penny Oleksiak as the only Canadians to earn four medals at a Summer Games.

“I don’t think it’s sunk in yet,” McIntosh said at a Canada Olympic House news conference. “I’m pretty sleep-deprived and tired, but coming here today, I knew that it would be so much fun to celebrate what Swimming Canada has done alongside my friends and my teammates.

“It’s been great, but it’ll definitely take a while for me to realize what exactly we’ve done. It’ll sink in more once I head back to Canada.”

She was expecting a second congratulatory call from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. He also called after the first of her three gold medals.

McIntosh spent a good part of Monday with all her hardware draped around her neck.

“My neck’s a little sore,” she stated.

She’s undaunted by the high bar she’s set for herself in the years ahead to Los Angeles in 2028.

“I always want more,” McIntosh said. “What keeps me in the sport is the job’s not finished. I have so much left I want to accomplish. I’m only 17.

“I have many more years in the sport, however long I want to go, so it just keeps