By Danny Daniels
At the UVic stadium, Connor McCullough, 12, used the weekend weather to produce convincing wins in the 100m (15.06), 200m (29.44), 300m (47.97), long jump (4.21m) and shot put (8.42m), all personal best performances. Isaiah Smith, 11, also had PBs while winning his 60m (9.47), 100m (15.84) and 200m (32.54) races, while nine-year-old Anita Truter, not to be outdone, had 1000m (4:09.72) and long jump (2.58m) PBs.
Jennifer Lui, 15, following on from her four event winning performance in Port Alberni the week before, triumphed in the discus (26.20m PB), hammer and shot, while placing second in the long jump. Caelan McEwan led the 16-year-olds in the junior category with a 300m hurdle PB of 44.78, together with 18.82 in the 110 hurdles and 1.55m high jump. Kaelen Smith, 15, showed similar prowess winning the HJ, LJ, 800m and placing second in the 200m hurdles, while 12-year-old Finn Battersby collected gold medals in 200m hurdles, 800m and the 1200m. Ben Sammons, 12, was golden in discus (19.77m) and Spencer Gaby, 18, again led the 1500m race walk field with his 8:02.86 time.
Although the heat was not necessarily a blessing for the distance runners, Annina Lorenzo, 16, pulled off impressive wins in both the 1500m (5:14.14) and 3000m (11:31.50), while Amelia Casciola, 15, and Piper Battersby, 14, had wins in their respective age group 1500m steeplechase events. An unusual “double” was achieved by Jacqueline Gaby, 15, when she placed second in both the 1500m steeplechase and the 1500m race walk events.
Younger Pen Trackers bringing back silver and bronze medals included Julia Irwin, Emma Mylie, Hannah Gartside, Hannah Archdekin, Julie Petersen, Emma Dennis, Thomas Healey, Yannick Truter, Matteo Hilton, Cameron Lorenzo, Thomas Gartside and Justin Miles, while at the masters level, also repeating their Port Alberni field event successes, Les East (M70) led the way with six gold medals, followed by Sandy Anderson (W70) with five golds, Anne Murfitt (W50) with four and Phil Brodeur, still firing on all cylinders in the M90 category, who picked up three more gold medallions.