Date of birth: June 26, 1994
Weight division: 63 kg – Height: 161 cm
Hometown: Saint-Hubert, Québec
Residence: Beloeil, Quebec
Judo Club: Club de Judo de Saint-Hubert inc. – Province: Quebec
Training place: Judo Canada National Training Centre in Montreal
National Team Coach : Antoine Valois-Fortier
HIGHLIGHTS
- 2022 & 2025 World Champion Runner-Up
- Bronze Medallist at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games
- 6-time Grand Slam Gold Medallist on the IJF World Tour
- 2-time Pan-American Champion (2019,2020)
- 2-time Junior World Championship Medallist (Silver 2013, Bronze 2014)
When Catherine Beauchemin-Pinard was a child, her sister played soccer and her brother practiced a martial art, but Catherine decided she wished to find her own sport. One day at school, she read an article about Nicolas Gill and his love of judo. That was all it took for her to determine that she had found what she was looking for. And so, at the age of nine, she began her life on the tatamis.
She initially drew inspiration from Isabel Latulippe, an athlete at her club, and from the Olympic performances of Nicolas Gill, Marie-Hélène Chisholm, and Antoine Valois-Fortier. Catherine’s junior record includes a silver medal at the 2013 World Junior Championships, followed by a bronze medal in 2014, making her the first female Canadian to have won two medals at the World Juniors.
In the summer of 2014, she won gold medals in three consecutive competitions: the Pan-American Open in San Salvador, the Grand Prix in Mongolia, and the Grand Slam in Russia. One year later, the Québécoise finished fifth at the World Championships.
Catherine then qualified for the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, after her excellent results had placed her in the top eight in the world in the preceding months.
Following the 2017 World Championships, Catherine changed weight classes. She has been competing in the under-63 kg category ever since, where she has been equally successful.
Catherine clinched the title of Pan-American champion in both 2019 and 2020. The best results of her career followed: a superb bronze medal at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games and, in 2022, runner-up world champion in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.
In addition, she published her book Nourrir son corps just weeks before the start of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. She went on to place 7th at the Paris Games and followed that up with another outstanding result—silver at the 2025 World Championships.