The St. Timothy Thunder cross country team is looking to defend its third straight 2A school silver medals at the Alberta Schools’ Athletic Association Provincials on Oct. 21 in Edmonton at Rundle Park.
The Thunder have qualified five members of its junior and senior high team to the provincial race after a successful City Championships on Oct. 11 at the Agricultural Grounds in Cochrane. Maggie Brolsma placed seventh in the junior girls race, Brenek Spademan placed sixteenth in junior boys.
Scott Delsing and Eric Swedlo finished 10th and 11th in intermediate boys, and Josh Novak placed the highest of all Thunder athletes, finishing in fourth in the senior boys race.
Thunder coach Travis Cummings was very impressed with how his team preformed at the championships.
“The top 18 in each division go to provincials, so we’ve got five going which is obviously good for the team and the school, they all did really well and executed their game plans” Cummings said.
“The team is looking good and it’s looking like we have a good shot at repeating as silver medallists at the 2A level in provincials. But we have to actually run the race first, but repeating is the goal.”
Strathcona Tweedsmuir School is the team that has placed ahead of St. Tim’s the last three years, and as Cummings said, his team is trying to play catch up due to the fact that your team gets more points the higher you finish.
“Strathcona (Tweedsmuir) is probably the best two way school in the 2A division,” Cummings said.
“They’re in the south central zone, which usually isn’t as tough as some of the other zones, so they’re able to qualify more athletes, and they usually have big numbers because it’s mandatory for all the kids there to run cross country… they usually qualify 15 to 20 kids and they have really good coaches, so they’re a tough team to beat.”
With that said, Cummings is just hoping for his team to put their best foot forward.
“If the team runs to potential, then winning the silver medal is kind of where I want them to be at… in an ideal world, it would be awesome to beat Strathcona Tweedsmuir, but I’m going to need a couple more bodies for that too happen,” Cummings said.
“But if all my athletes do their best, and run to their potential, we should be able to defend our silver medals.”
