It was a long day for the Barrhead Elementary School (BES) indoor track team, but it was worth the effort.
That is how the coaching staff and four members of the BES indoor track team characterized their effort at the Running Room Indoor Games.
The Barrhead Leader talked to the group three days after the contingent of five different relay teams returned home with a silver and two fourth place finishes in the eight by 200 metre relay by the BES teachers, elementary school and junior high school girls, respectively. The elementary school boys finished third in the consolation final and the junior high school boys made it into the semifinals, also in the eight by 200 metre relay.
The games have been taking place in one form or another for the last 39 years. They allow Grades 3 to 12 athletes the opportunity to experience the thrill of competition against hundreds of other schools across the province — this year about 300 took part.
BES has competed for more than 20 of those years, the majority being in the eight by 200 metre relay events. Last year the elementary and junior high school girls won silver, while the teachers captured the bronze. Although the boys elementary and junior high contingent finished out of the medals, they still finished a respectable fourth and 12th respectively.
The teams qualified for the final day of competition at an event at the Butterdome in February.
The contingent left BES at 6:00 a.m. on March 17, arriving at Edmonton’s Butterdome on the University of Alberta campus with the girls elementary school contingent racing at about 8:30 a.m. and the boys racing shortly afterwards.
The girls won their heat, which automatically qualified them for the semi finals. The elementary boys finished third in their heat, which was good enough for them to advance into the semi finals.
“They finished 22nd out of the 24 teams that went moved on to the semi finals, so they really had their work cut out for them,” said coach Jaylene Blum of the elementary school boys’ squad.
In the semifinals the elementary school girls once again finished first in their heat qualifying them for the finals. The boys finished in third, which qualified them for the consolation finals.
On the junior high boys side Blum said they were in tough with the majority of the teams they faced in their quarterfinal heat being composed of teams that were two years older that they were.
“I couldn’t believe how fast they were,” Alex Heimstra, Grade 5 interjected. As for the junior high girls, Blum said the team ran extremely well in both the quarter and semifinals.
In between heats, coach Martha Friesen said, the teams were all given a room in one of the nearby education buildings.
“Which was important because it was a really long day for them 12 to 14 hours long and there were some really long breaks in between heats,” she said, noting between the elementary school quarter and semi finals there was about a four-hour gap.
Although some of the BES team members, admit at times they didn’t use their rest period to their full advantage.
“There was a lot of nervous energy,” said Rylyn Hayes, Grade 6.
In the finals the girls finished in fifth place, however after review, one of the teams was disqualified and they moved into fourth. On the boys side the elementary school boys finished third in the consolation final.
“We couldn’t be more proud of how everyone did. They really worked hard all year to get to this point and left it all on the track,” Blum said. “When you think of all the teams that took part, more than 300 and for us to make it as far as we did on the final day that really says something about the kids and our program.”
Lunay Wepner, Grade 6, said the thing she will remember about the games is how nervous she was.
“Especially the closer it got to the final,” she said.
Ashlee Keith, Grade 6, agreed saying one of the more nerve-wracking things was watching the other teams, many of them tripping and falling, often during the passing of the baton.
Colton Keough, Grade 6, agreed saying that is why his favourite part of the experience was when he was running, adding that is when he was able to block out all the other distractions and concentrate on the task at hand.
Friesen noted that although she has been to the Butterdome the last two seasons as a coach, when she was younger she competed as a member of the BES contingent.
“It is strange coming back. It [Butterdome] still smells the same and it brings back all those memories and just like the students said today how nerve-wracking it was and how my coaches helped push us to overcome that nervousness,” she said. “I think I’m even more nervous as a coach, because you want so much for them to do well because you know they can do it.”
