Hail Ceaser

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This article was published 03/08/2023 (818 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg Fire Paramedic Service Captain Cindy Ceaser had her hands full this week — she served as the sport co-ordinator for the open water swim event in St. Malo on Wednesday for the World Police and Fire Games — and still found the time to win two medals in the pool on Sunday.

Ceaser won gold in the 100 metre-freestyle event and a silver in the 50m breaststroke in the 45-49 age classification.

“I was really busy on the organizing end of things and worrying about my event… I just picked those events because that was a day that I could squeeze them in,” said Ceaser.

The fire captain has been swimming for nearly three decades but got her start in the pool competing in synchronized swimming.

“Growing up I was a synchronized swimmer competitively in Manitoba for about 15 years; speed swimming wasn’t actually my thing.”

Ceaser competed for Manitoba in the 1991 and 1995 Canada Winter Games in synchronized swimming (the event was renamed artistic swimming in 2017). She retired from the sport after the 1995 games, but continued to swim recreationally as she pursued a career in firefighting.

A decade later, Ceaser heard about the World Police and Fire Games that were set to take place in Adelaide, Australia, in 2007. A group of Winnipeg firefighters made plans to go to the land Down Under and Ceaser decided to tag along.

Adelaide also marked a return to competitive swimming for the Winnipegger.

“When we were talking about going to the games in 2007… I thought swimming would be natural for me,” said Ceaser. “My first sport and my first love was in the pool so I thought ‘Well, I guess I’ll pick some swimming events and do those.’”

At those games, speed was the name of the game, not synchronization. Ceaser looked like a seasoned pro in her debut in speed swimming, winning three golds and two bronzes in Adelaide. She could have even come away with a sixth medal in the 200m individual medley, however her inexperience in speed swimming reared its head in that particular race.

“In 2007, one of my competitions that I did was the 200m individual medley. It’s four different strokes… You’re switching strokes at the end of every length of the pool and every stroke has to touch the wall at a certain body position and a certain turn to transition to the next stroke, and I disqualified myself because I made a wrong turn and I didn’t know,” she said.

Ceaser would have won a silver medal if not for the disqualification.

“I just kind of winged it and it happened to be wrong,” she said with a laugh.

Five medals in Adelaide and two in Winnipeg is nothing to sneeze at, but Ceaser says she values the camaraderie and the support that all the competitors show each other at the Games far more than any piece of hardware.

“The results of the race are kind of a bonus. It’s not even really what everybody really wants to know — everybody is just caught up with cheering each other on.”

Supporting others and building togetherness is also something that Ceaser does as a fire captain.

“Building team camaraderie within the fire hall is a big part of the job,” she said. “‘Let’s be safe and help some people today,’ is the attitude.”

Ceaser has helped too many people to count over her time as a firefighter, but one story in particular still brings tears to her eyes.

In her first year as a firefighter, she was able to pull a girl out of a fire. The young lady had suffered a number of burns and was quickly sent to the hospital. Ceaser and the rest of the crew were not able to find out if she was okay.

“We don’t always get to know what happens to the victims that we help in those kinds of situations,” she said.

Seven years later, she told the story to a burn-unit nurse whose eyes got wide when she heard the details.

“She told me, ‘I know exactly who you’re talking about and she’s always wanted to meet the firefighters that saved her that day.’” said Ceaser.

The nurse put Ceaser in contact with the individual and Ceaser had her over for dinner at the fire hall.

“It was really great, we don’t get that very often… she was so happy to have met us and wanted to thank us for what we did. It was wonderful and special and the one story in my career I will never forget.”

donald.stewart@freepress.mb.ca