A Bragg Creek athlete had the jump on the opposition at the Alberta Summer Games last weekend.
Brent Armeneau won the U15 long jump, high jump and triple jump at the Games which were held in Lethbridge on July 29-30.
He set a personal best in winning the high jump at 1.75m on Saturday.
“I was the only one who cleared the bar at 1.75 and my personal best was 1.70 before,” said Armeneau, who is going into Grade 9 at Banded Peak School in Bragg Creek. “I tried at 1.80, but I just barely missed.”
Armeneau had to be quick on his feet on Saturday because the high jump was going on at the same time as the triple jump at the University of Lethbridge.
Armeneau had to pass on his first two attempts in the triple jump because he was too busy clearing the bar in the high jump.
It put him under some pressure because the top eight triple jumpers out of 16 after three rounds qualify for the final in which they get three more attempts. Armeneau decided to play it safe on his one jump rather than be sorry and miss the finals.
“I knew I had to jump well before the board so I wouldn’t fault,” Armeneau said. “I just had to pretty well get over the board to qualify.”
He did better than that, jumping 11.92m which was a personal best, but not for long.
Armeneau jumped 12.10m and 12.28m in his next two attempts. However, he found himself behind Brendan Calef of Ft. Saskatchewan at 12.30.
The Bragg Creek leaper saved his best for last — his final triple jump was 12.38m, to give him the gold medal.
“I was really excited because I had been trying to clear 12 meters all year,” he said.
Although it would have been great to celebrate, Armeneau hit the sack early on Saturday night.
“I was in bed at 10:30 p.m. and got up at 5 a.m. to get ready for the long jump on Sunday,” he said.
The rest did him some good.
He was the only U15 long jumper to jump six meters and five of his six jumps were beyond his personal best. His winning leap of 6.31m was two centimetres off the provincial record.
Armeneau was able to set a national standard in his victory.
However, he won’t be going to the national track and field championships in PEI later this month because of a subpar performance at the provincial championships earlier this year.
Fast Family
Turning in strong performances at the Alberta Summer Games runs in a Priddis family.
The Shermans, twin brothers Christian and Michael and sister Sierra, won four medals in Lethbridge. It was Sierra who led the family by winning four medals.
The 16-year-old Sierra won the U17 girls 400m, second in the 300m hurdles and she picked up a pair of bronze medals in the 200m and the 4x100m relay.
She admitted the 400m is a lung and leg burner.
“I was second for most of the race until about the last 100m,” Sierra said. “With about 80m left, I didn’t slow down at all. It was one of my best runs ever. “At 200m, my legs were tired but I told myself to just keep going because I thought I should win.”
Her time was 58.46.
She was second in the 300m hurdles at 47.14 — the first time she had ever ran the event.
“There are only seven hurdles in the 300m and my hurdling wasn’t very good because I thought I was going to fall,” she said with a smile.
“In between the hurdles is where I picked things up. Over the hurdles, I was okay, but I wasn’t my best.”
She said she was disappointed in her bronze medal time of 26.40 in the 200m.
“I had to run my 200m prelim and then my 300m hurdle final and then the 200m final with only an hour between each race,” she said. “I was pretty tired.”
Christian, 14, was third in the U15 boys 200m.
“My time was 24.37 seconds that’s .30 off my best time,” he said.
“I was happy because I got third.”
His twin brother Michael’s best finish at the Games was fourth in the U15 100m. His time was 11.90 seconds.
