Athletes from across the Semiahmoo Peninsula made their way onto the provincial podium last weekend, at BC Track and Field Championships in Coquitlam.
South Surrey-based Ocean Athletics’ athletes combined for a total of 28 individual medals, as well as eight more in relay events. Alexa Porpaczy, who competes for the Valley Royals track club and is fresh from a gold medal in high jump at Canadian championships earlier this month, also added another gold medal to her quickly growing collection, while Tyrell Mara – a longtime South Surrey resident now living in Langley – also won gold, in men’s discus.
Like Porpaczy, Mara was also a medallist at nationals, winning bronze in discus at the Ottawa competition.
In Coquitlam, Ocean Athletics was led by sprinter Valda Kabia, who repeated as B.C. champion in the women’s 200-m with a time of 24.73 seconds. The runner – who will attend East Texas A&M University this fall, a news release notes – also won silver in the 100-m.
Owen Pinto also won multiple medals at the provincial competiton, winning the midget boys 800-m in a time of 1:57.68, while also snagging a silver medal in the 1,200-m. Other gold medallists included Tyler Wilson, who was first in the midget 1,500-m racewalk; Emma de Boer, first in midget girls high jump; Emmanuel Dadson, first in youth triple jump; and Olivia van Ryswyk, who took top spot in the youth pole vault with a leap of 2.90-m.
Elijah de Hoog also won two silver medals – in junior long jump and triple-jump – while Kayla Smith also ended up on the podium twice after winning silver in midget girls 400-m and bronze in the 800-m. Miya Kobylanski won silver and bronze, too – in midget girls steeplechase and 2,000-m, respectively – while Roy Jiang was another multiple-medal winner, with silver in midget boys 100-m and bronze in the 200-m.
Other silver medallists were: Kiera Pederson (junior 100-m), Dominique Luccock (junior decathlon), Aneel Gillan (midget pentathlon), Angela Peters (midget 200-m), Ryan Pederson (youth long jump) and Tristin Ghintel (midget pole vault).
Bronze medallists from Ocean Athletics were Madeline Bonikowsky (midget 800-m), Tess Bulka (junior 100-m hurdles), Ryan Denman (youth high jump), Macy Michaud (youth pole vault), Gabrielle Hack (youth triple jump), Kenny Blackman, Jr. (youth 100-m) and Darren Ahn (midget high jump).
Track meet moved
The BC Junior Development Track and Field Championships are coming to South Surrey this weekend, after a last-minute move from the Okanagan.
Originally, the event was set to be held in Kelowna, but BC Athletics announced July 14 that due to air-quality issues in the Okanagan city – a result of the many wildfires in the area – the event had been moved to South Surrey Athletic Park.
The event is set for July 21-23.