A growing track program in the city, the Yorkton Legion Track Club has been steadily increasing the quality of track and field athletes in the area over the past few years and recently reached a benchmark for the club in sending 14 athletes to represent Team Saskatchewan at the Western Canada Championships.
After a successful high school track season, the club track athletes of the YLTC built on a hard year of training and success at various meets around Western Canada leading up to the Saskatchewan Athletics Provincial Championships in which 14 of their 34 athletes qualified for spots on Team Saskatchewan.
YLTC manager Marcel Porte mentions that the growing program's success has been tied into making it more aware that there are options for track athletes year round in the province like in any sport, something he says he finds some athletes are unaware of. "The awareness around Saskatchewan Athletics is low," says Porte. "Many parents and young athletes don't realize that there are track meets from November all the way to June with Sask Athletics (which is not part of the school system). "We had ten 2001/2002 born athletes attend this meet this year. It was great to see more interest in track and field from that young age group and they did very well to represent our area."
The 14 athletes qualifying for Westerns is a new high for the YLTC, who sent just one athlete for the 2012 Westerns in Medicine Hat.
Last year they sent five athletes to 2013 Westerns in Calgary. With the meet being in Saskatoon for 2014, the YLTC hit their new high at the perfect time and even surpassed Porte's dream goal of having double digit representatives in Saskatoon this summer.
"My goal was to have 10 athletes represent this area," says Porte. "The Western Canadian Championship with be held in Saskatoon this year on July 18 - 20th. We are very excited that we will have a good presence at this meet."
Yorkton even saw one of their athletes qualify for the 2014 Midget National Track and Field Championships as Derek Campbell ran the qualification time in the 2,000 meter distance event in stunning time to qualify to represent the city against some of the best young distance runners in Canada.
"We are all very proud of Derek," says Porte. "The national standard for the 2,000m is 6:22.00 and Derek did it in 6:16.6, that is over a 6 second difference, says Porte who also mentions that Campbell is very close to qualifying for the 1,200 meter and 800 meter events. "He is also three seconds off the 1,200m and four seconds off the 800m, which he will still have an opportunity to qualify at Westerns for the National Competition."
The full list of qualified athletes is as follows:
Midget Team (Under 16) Jarod Stachowich, Derek Campbell, Kelsey Haczkewicz, Nicki Nagy, Brooke Hausermann, Karlee Duczek, Youth Team (Under 18) Cole Burkholder, Mikaila Ortynsky, Jonah Sutter, Kellie Onda-Inglis, Jared Yeadon, Evan Lajambe, Justine Zarowny, Jaden Porte
