Penny Oleksiak's Paris 2024 journey rocky, but decorated swimmer ready to battle for Canada

Canada's most decorated athlete learned the power of grace heading into her third, but perhaps not her last, Olympic Games.

Owner of seven Olympic swimming medals at just 23 years old, Penny Oleksiak's three years since Tokyo threw two knee surgeries and a shoulder injury at her, limiting her ability to train and compete.

When she felt stuck, Oleksiak executed a rite of passage into adulthood by figuring out how to get unstuck. That involved leaving her hometown of Toronto.

"If I had to sum it up in one word, it would probably be 'unexpected,'" Oleksiak said. "I've had a very trying last couple years and a lot of things happening back-to-back.

"It's been a really different experience for me. I've learned a lot about myself in the last few years, how much patience I have and how to give myself grace in a lot of situations."

Oleksiak didn't qualify for an individual event in Paris. She'll be deployed in relays starting with the women's 4x100-metre freestyle Saturday.

"It's been hard definitely to wrap my head around the fact that I'm not competing in an individual event, but I'm still competing in quite a few events," Oleksiak said. "I'm still aiming to do some really impressive things, and training really hard to be able to do those things and contribute to the team as much as I have in the past and see what impact I can have.

"I'm always looking at it through a really realistic lens of, as an athlete, my goals are always to be on the podium. I don't think that's going to change at this Olympics."

Her seven medals are the most won by a Canadian Olympian. Oleksiak's been a relay gamer throughout her career.

WATCH | Oleksiak 1st in women's 100m freestyle at Olympic trials:

She anchored the 4x100 free relay to silver and