Skip to content

Eight-year-old Harley MacDonnell wins two medals at arm-wrestling championships

Okotoks: Youth wins arms race
armwrestling1
Eight-year-old Harley MacDonnell and dad Morgan MacDonnell at the Canadian National Arm-Wrestling championships at West Edmonton Mall July 13-14.

It pays to follow in dad’s footsteps.

Eight-year-old Harley MacDonnell decided to compete in arm-wrestling with her dad Morgan this spring.

She now has bragging rights at home.

Harley won the gold medal for right arm and the silver medal for left at the Canadian National Arm-Wrestling championships for U13 30kg in Edmonton on July 13-14.

It was an open — which meant she had to come to grips with arm-wrestling boys.

“I was the tiniest bit nervous for the first round,” said Harley, a French Immersion student at École Percy Pegler School. “But at the finals I wasn’t.”

She faced Red Deer’s Brayden Looker in the final.

Looker, who had to come up through the B side to get to the final, had to beat the undefeated MacDonnell twice to claim the championship.

He put the Okotoks family on edge when he won the first match. In the second match, Harley was losing before putting all her might into it to win the match and the national title.

“I had to push back,” she said. “When I am like this (behind) I put my body over it so I can get (some leverage).”

Looker was able to extract some friendly revenge by downing Harley in the left-handed final.

Harley had advanced to nationals by winning a bronze medal in the 7 and 9 year old division in June at the provincial meet in Airdrie  — no weight classes. She was the only girl and was seven at the time.

“She had never arm-wrestled before and asked to do it,” said dad Morgan. “We said we would give it a try and she won a bronze. She was accepted to the nationals… she ended up beating the boys she had lost to at provincials.”

Morgan is a member of the Calgary Rams Arm-wrestling Club and also had a strong showing at provincials and nationals.

“Not as well as Harley,” Morgan said with a smile.

He won gold in provincials for right hand at 80 kg and silver for left. At nationals he was fifth and sixth in right and left, respectively.

He credits the Rams club for getting his family involved.

“Those people have been really supportive and have taught me a lot on how to arm-wrestle and then I pass that on knowledge down to Harley,” Morgan said.

Morgan said he would love to establish an Okotoks arm-wrestling club, to cut down on the drive to north Calgary to train.

The sport combines strength and technique. Harley works out with light-weights, arm curls and works with stretching bands – it’s a controlled workout program for her age.

Dad and daughter’s plans are to go to more tournaments in the future.

For more information about the national arm-wrestling championships go to cawfa.ca

push icon
Be the first to read breaking stories. Enable push notifications on your device. Disable anytime.
No thanks