Cassandra Foy of Manitoba has received the Dave Smith Award after winning gold in post-secondary car painting at the Skills Canada National Competition 2026.
The award includes a $2,500 prize from AkzoNobel, an Amsterdam-based paints and coatings manufacturer with automotive refinishing operations.
The award was announced June 18 on the Skills/Compétences Canada website. Foy won the post-secondary car painting category at the national competition, which was held May 28 and 29 in Toronto.
Foy also received Manitoba’s RBC Best of Region Award, which recognizes top competitors from each province and territory at the national event.
In the post-secondary car painting results, Foy took gold, Tommy Michaud of New Brunswick took silver and Emily Frick of British Columbia took bronze.
The Dave Smith Award is presented to the post-secondary gold medalist in car painting. AkzoNobel introduced the award in 2019 in memory of Dave Smith, a longtime automotive coatings industry figure who spent 25 years with AkzoNobel.
Smith began his AkzoNobel career in 1993 and held senior roles across the company’s North American automotive and specialty coatings business, including positions tied to Canadian operations, industry relations and collision repair networks.
The award was created to support continued education in vehicle refinishing. It has since become an annual prize connected to the Skills Canada National Competition’s post-secondary car painting category.
The Skills Canada National Competition brings together students and apprentices from across the country in skilled trades and technology categories. For the collision repair sector, the car painting competition gives young refinishers a national stage to demonstrate surface preparation, colour work, spray technique and finishing skills under competition conditions.
The award also points to the continuing need for trained refinishers in the collision repair industry. As shops face labour pressure, competitions such as Skills Canada remain a visible recruitment and training showcase for the next generation of repair professionals.
Foy’s win places Manitoba at the top of the post-secondary car painting field for 2026 and adds her name to the list of Dave Smith Award recipients recognized through the Skills Canada program.
