Okotoks athletes weather tough provincial cross country conditions

Speed, endurance, balance and adaptability were all required when Alberta’s top runners arrived to a slick track and wet conditions at the Alberta Schools’ Athletic Association Cross Country Provincial Championships Saturday in Grande Prairie.

“We had six out of the 11 in the top-50,” said Holy Trinity Academy Knights coach Paula Paulgaard. “At provincials, that’s pretty fast and pretty impressive and how well they did considering the conditions.

“It was supposed to be sunny and 12 and it turned into rainy and five and the course was really slick. Every kid that came in was covered in mud, lots of them had slipped, you could tell it was a hard course with the conditions yet people were running super fast.

“I was really impressed with our team. I would almost say that everyone ran their best race.”

The junior boys and girls lucked out with the best of the worst conditions on Saturday as the first to compete.

Grade 10 Knight Milo Evans crossed the finish line in 12:58 to claim the bronze medal.

“The walk through made it clear that the course was going to be pretty difficult, with the mud, and all of the hills,” Evans said. “After every uphill there was a downhill so I tried to recover each time for the next downhill. That was my strategy.”

Following a tough start, Evans found himself in the 10-15 pack and had to work his way back to the top three.

“Cross country isn’t usually the discipline I excel in,” said Evans, a club track-and-field competitor. “So it felt really good to get a medal.”

The Knights’ other finalists included Grade 12s Kira Bartos (15^th), Eva Gustafson (37^th), Grade 11s Jamie Burchell (37^th), Cadrien Harker (43^rd), Jaelyn Wood (57^th) and Grade 10s Camy O’Callaghan (32^nd), Lyvia Gill (68^th), Julianna Brown (74^th), Eric Michel (88^th) and Xavier Gay (94^th).

Paulgaard said Bartos’ 15^th place performance was impressive, especially given the fact she doesn’t compete at the club level as do many of the top provincial qualifiers.

“She just looked so solid,” the coach added. “She started really focusing on doing well in her Grade 12 year.

“Our team is so full of heart and determination and grit and it showed up.”

Likewise for the six Foothills Falcons competing in Grande Prairie.

“We knew it was going to be a rough course from iffy weather especially for runners that didn’t have spikes,” said Foothills coach Danyka Culbert. “There were a lot of kids falling down the hills multiple times.”

Grade 11 Noah Heuver was the top finisher for the Falcons with an 11^th place showing in the intermediate boys. His older brother Nathan was 21^st in the senior boys ranks with fellow Grade 12 Nash Byam in 30^th.

Finlay Moore finished 55^th in the junior boys race with Kieran Gaffney adding an 83^rd place finish in the intermediate boys.

Elsewhere, Oilfields Grade 11 student Carver Morris, the provincial champion in the junior boys event last October, raced to a fifth place finish.

The Strathcona-Tweedsmuir Spartans had another strong showing with 12 athletes crossing the finish line at provincials.

Top-50 finishers included Grade 12s Nathanial Horsman (39^th), Abby Meheriuk (39^th) and Maia McGillivray (46^th), Grade 11  Lucy Govender (40^th), along with Grade 10s Noah Bishop (26^th) and Meghan McGillivray (45^th).

For more information go to asaa.ca/cross-country.