North Shore athletes showed well in the first-ever British Columbia-hosted Canada Winter Games over the past two weeks, led by a pair of talented athletes who hit the podium in Prince George despite competing in unfamiliar sports.
North Vancouver's Emily Weekes scored three silver medals in para cross-country skiing, a sport she took up less than a year ago. The 24-year-old was a former wrestling star, having competed in that sport in the 2007 B.C. Summer Games and 2009 Canada Summer Games held on Prince Edward Island. Two weeks before the 2009 Summer Games, however, Weekes suffered an injury that left her with nerve damage in her right arm. She taped up the injury and won bronze for Team BC in P.E.I. but over the next few years the injury worsened. Looking for a new sport, Weekes first took up triathlon before moving to cross-country skiing this season after being recruited by Tony Chin of West Vancouver's Hollyburn Cross Country Ski Club. "I had never even skied alpine when I started cross country," stated Weekes in a Team BC release. "I competed internationally in triathlon and wrestling and skiing really isn't that different. Everything about competing is the same - the mental preparation, the focus, the execution. So it made it easier to move into a new sport because I've been involved in sport my whole life."
In Prince George, Weekes finished second in the women's 2.5-kilometre standing classic race, the 1.2-km standing sprint and the five-km standing race. The Carson Graham grad, who is also training in para biathlon, is excited about her future on the snow.
"I'm actually doing way better than I expected and I kind of wish I had started this sooner," she said. "I wrestled for nine years then I did triathlon for five years but I've picked up skiing much faster than either of those sports. It's been really fun and my coaches have been unbelievably supportive."
The North Shore's only Winter Games gold went to West Vancouver's Katie Fleckenstein who dominated the competition in the women's ski cross finals held at Tabor Mountain.
Fleckenstein's win was all the more impressive considering she'd never competed in a ski cross competition before. The 15-year-old also competed in her preferred alpine races at the Games, but it was in ski cross that she cruised all the way to the top of the podium. Fleckenstein finished first in qualifying and then won all of her elimination heats the following day, holding off her Team BC teammate Nicole Mah in the final to claim gold.
"As I was going through my heats today I was winning so I was getting more and more into it," Fleckenstein said in a Team BC release. "To win the gold was amazing, it was just so much fun."
Fleckenstein finished seventh in Super G, 10th in slalom and crashed in her preferred race, the slalom, earlier in the Games.
Despite the win, Fleckenstein isn't sure if a full-time switch to ski cross is in her future. "Ski cross is fun, but the alpine, you're by yourself and doing your own thing," she told Postmedia News. "And just the way the ski feels is nicer."
North Vancouver's Mark Robertson scored silver in para-alpine giant slalom. The 15-year-old claimed his medal despite battling through an injury that kept him off the slopes for much of the season. "I've been out with a knee injury so that has really affected my training," he stated in a Team BC release. "I didn't know what to expect and it hurt a bit but some Advil and putting it in the snow settled it down." Robertson reportedly did not enter a competition this season prior to the race, instead spending his time working with a physio to get his knee into shape for the Games.
"I finished fourth at nationals last year but this is my first big win," he said. "It's pretty special and it's something I've never experienced. The course was really good and the snow was great, absolutely perfect."
Katie Weaver and Eliza-Jane Kitchen, a pair of North Vancouver skiers, helped Team BC win silver in the women's 4x3.75-km cross-country relay. Kitchen raced the anchor leg, maintaining the team's second-place position right through the finish line.
"It was the greatest feeling ever coming into the stadium," stated Kitchen in a Team BC release. "I started to get a little choked up and it was amazing to come in there and have all our friends and family and people from the community out here cheering for us. It was an incredible feeling."
North Vancouver's Michael Sibley also hit the podium in Prince George, winning bronze as a member of the province's men's gymnastics team. Aaron Mah and Darren Wong from Vancouver, Cameron Stanley from Cultus Lake, Steven Chaplin from Mission, and Alexander Farquharson from Delta joined Sibley to place third behind Ontario and Quebec.
