North Vancouver’s Adrian Tongko is the answer to anyone who tells you that to become an elite athlete, a kid must specialize in a sport at a young age.
Tongko, an 18-year-old who graduated from Argyle secondary last year, is one of 23 North Shore athletes named to Team B.C. for the Canada Winter Games scheduled for Feb. 13-March 1 in Prince George.
Tongko will go for gold in snowboard slopestyle, a fan-friendly, terrain-park inspired event that debuted at the Winter Olympics last year. That’s a pretty good achievement considering Tongko was born in the Philippines and spent his childhood there before his family moved to North Vancouver when he was nine. So, was there much snow in the Philippines?
“No,” Tongko says incredulously. “Ha. No. It’s way too hot. . . . Basketball was pretty much what was big in the Philippines.””
In fact, Tongko had never even seen snow before he moved to Canada. Many elite skiers and snowboarders come from mountain families, learning to compete while chasing their parents up and down the slopes from a very young age. Tongko’s family was not like that. He didn’t hit the slopes until he was 10 years old when he and his family, including brother Matt, mother Christine and father Robert, cautiously tried out the snow.
“My mom skied, but she couldn’t keep up with me and my brother,” he says. “And my dad tried snowboarding once. . . . it didn’t go so well.”
Matt, five years older than Adrian, soon latched onto snowboarding as his mountain sport of choice. “Obviously I wanted to do whatever he did,” says Adrian. “So my parents got me a snowboard and a pass to Seymour. I’ve been snowboarding ever since.”
The first time was tough.
“My butt hurt,” he says. “I remember going really fast and never really turning.”
But he kept at it, moving over to Grouse after the first year and hitting the terrain parks whenever he could.
“I kind of taught myself how to snowboard,” he says. “I never did a class or anything. I always went up with my friends.”
Whatever he was teaching himself, it worked well enough to land him a spot on the B.C Snowboard Development Team three years ago under the guidance of coach Dane Kaechele.
“We’ve been able to go travel to the States, get to come to Whistler every weekend and train,” says Tongko. “That was a big help.”
Tongko says he’s starting to realize his full potential this season. His recent results landed him a Top-2 ranking in the province and earned him a spot on Team B.C. for the Canada Winter Games.
Tongko says this whole ride has been “totally unexpected.”
“I’m pretty excited,” he says. “I’m stoked to see what it’s going to be like competition-wise, what the mountains are like there in Prince George.”
In Prince George he’ll follow his normal game plan of making his slopestyle runs look especially good.
“I like to put a lot of style into my tricks, more than amplitude,” he says. “Make it look good — put my (personal) touch on snowboarding. . . . It’s a lot of fun. There’s lots of freedom in the sport. It’s very expressive — that’s what I like about it.”
Tongko may be surprised at how far the sport has taken him but it’s even more surprising for other competitors and snowboard fans who learn that the guy throwing down the sweet tricks on the slopes spent his childhood in a tropical rainforest.
“They’re just surprised,” he says with a laugh. “They’re a little shocked.”
Tongko hopes to keep surprising people on the slopes for as long as he can.
“Just keep snowboarding, that’s it,” he says about his future plans. “See where it takes me.”
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Other North Shore notables headed to the Canada Winter Games include Katie Weaver, a multi-sport star who has won national age-group medals in both track and field and cross-country skiing, and hockey player Jordy Bellerive, who was selected No. 2 overall in the 2014 WHL bantam draft.
Here are Team B.C. athletes and coaches that list North Vancouver or West Vancouver as their hometown or place of residence, according to teambc.org:
North Vancouver:
• Alpine skiing: Kyle Alexander, Asher Jordan, Frances MacDonald, Kristina Natalenko (New Westminster hometown, trains in North Vancouver)
• Cross country skiing: Eliza Jane Kitchen, Katherine (Katie) Weaver, Kajsa Heyes (Vancouver hometown, North Vancouver resident)
• Artistic gymnastics: Michael Sibley, Dorina Stan (manager)
• Hockey, female: Jenna Hewitt-Kenda, Leona Sim
• Hockey, male: Jordan (Jordy) Bellerive
• Para alpine: Mark Robertson
• Para Nordic: Lindsey McDonald, Samuel Piercey, Emily Weekes
• Ringette: Nina Tajbakhsh
• Snowboard: Christopher Nakonechny (technical support), Dane Kaechele (coach, Roberts Creek hometown), Adrian Tongko
• Synchronized swimming: Stefanie Dickinson
West Vancouver:
• Alpine skiing: Katie Fleckenstein, Sierra King, Ella Renzoni
• Hockey, female: Rachel Raffard, Natalie Stanwood.
