Our Valley Royals Distance Group had a fantastic showing at the recent East Valley Cross Country Championships.
Running against very large fields of competitors, both Adrianna Buitelaar and Damian Sutton finished close to a minute ahead of their nearest competition to claim East Valley Titles in the junior girls and grade 8 boys divisions.
In the junior boys division, we had seven athletes in the top nine positions who all advanced to provincial championships. This was an amazing accomplishment in the toughest junior boys qualifying race in the province where the top three finishers were Canadian Champions or silver medallists. For this accomplishment a big shout out goes to Sam May, Will Van Schagen, Arata Nakanishi, Miles Graham, Riley Simmonds, Arie Wassenaar, and Tristian Steiger.
In the senior boys division, Mark Molina and Mack Lascelle had strong races grabbing the silver and bronze medals, and in the senior girls division Zoe Unger took the silver. Jasmine Halwas ran a very strong race to grab a qualifying berth to provincials finishing 14th in the junior girls and Jonah Kasse, and Jonah Dyck both came up with big races to secure an East Valley Team Championship for Sardis. William Steiger ran strongly in the grade 8 boys division despite not being in full form, and Sam Rasquinha came up with a strong race running up a category in the senior boys division.
Way to go Royals and we will have a great contingent heading to Victoria for the BC High School Championships in early November. – Coach Scott
