Pierre Lafontaine

Lori Ewing/The Canadian Press

Canada heads home from the 15th Pan American Games with more medals than the team captured four years ago, and with several Beijing Olympic berths secured.

Just a year before the 2008 Summer Games, the Pan Ams were an Olympic dress rehearsal for some athletes, a chance to qualify for others, and an opportunity to gain some much-needed international experience for all.

But a theme of these Games was also about instilling a culture of winning - and in that Canadian officials say they were a big success.

"Winning is a skill and once you've done it once, you get hungry. I've been to the dessert part of the buffet table and I want to go back," said Alex Gardiner, the Canadian Olympic Committee's senior director of Olympic programming. "The more times you can get on a podium, whether it's here, the Commonwealth Games, world university games, a national championship, it's a huge confidence builder and it tells you, 'OK, now I can compete with the best.'"

After 18 days of competition, in more than 40 sports, Canadians marched to the top of the podium 39 times in Rio and captured 137 medals (39 gold, 43 silver, 55 bronze). That topped the 129 medals Canada won at the 2003 Games in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic.

Canada finished third overall in total medals at Rio, behind the U.S. and Brazil, and fourth in gold medals won. The United States led the way with 237 (97-88-52), Brazil had 161 (54-40-67), while Cuba totalled 135 (59-35-41).

Canada also locked up eight Olympic berths - the men's team in field hockey, Avianno Chao of Toronto in women's 10-metre air pistol, Giuseppe Di Salvatore of Surrey, B.C., in men's trap, the equestrian squad in team eventing, team dressage and team jumping, and a men's and a women's position in modern pentathlon.

"We've had some terrific performances at these Games and we're proud of all the Canadian athletes who competed here," said Canada's chef de mission Tricia Smith. "We had medals in a wide variety of sports and certainly felt we created an environment for success at these Games that we want to duplicate in Beijing."

The swim team led the way with 18 medals - one gold, five silver and 12 bronze - five more than in 2003.

Pierre Lafontaine, national coach and Swimming Canada's CEO, brought a "B" team to Rio to expand the talent pool, and the young squad exceeded his prediction of 12 medals.  "For a young group of kids, it was a very good meet," said Lafontaine. "To me, the greatest part was these kids want to win, they want to race, they're not happy with fourth, they're not happy with third and they're sure not happy with second, which I'm not sure if we had seen that in a long time."

In one of the highlights at the pool, Annamay Pierse of Edmonton rebounded from food poisoning to set Canadian records in the 100 and 200-metre breaststroke.

Adam Kunkel of Paisley, Ont., shattered his Canadian record and defeated Olympic gold medallist Felix Sanchez en route to gold in the 400-metre hurdles.

Rhythmic gymnast Alexandra Orlando of Toronto was Canada's most decorated athlete, with three gold medals.