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Busy season for OTFC

The Oceanside Track and Field Club still has much more excitement to come this season
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OTFC standouts. Back

“Oh my goodness, we have had a busy track and field season, with still lots of excitement to come.”

Oceanside Track and Field coach Kim Longmuir was in a great mood when The News caught up with her recently, and for good reason, as the local club has been busy training and mining more medals this summer; setting records, and ramping up for more.

OTFC’s Brycen Dorsay, ‘the twins’ Thomas and Peter Oxland, Daniel Stewart, Kabir Bellerose, Taylor Chestnut, Jenn Erickson, Bassett sisters Miryam, Hannah, and Rebecca, and Tkia King, were at the Midget/Youth Provincials (for athletes 14 and over) recently. Some of the OTFC athletes are hoping to make Team BC bound for the Royal Canadian Legion nationals in Ottawa in August.

The Oxland twins and Miryam Bassett, says Longmuir, “all have a very good chance to make that team. The criteria is very stiff. They have to win (their event) and they have to run under the B.C. standard in order to make the team, the B.C. standard is the hardest of all the provinces. Basically B.C. will only send kids who they think will have a chance to medal at nationals, so it becomes a very elite team.”

OTFC coaches Randy and Kim Longmuir continue to be recognized for their contributions to the sport as they have been selected to help coach Team BC in Ottawa.

OTFC also has a strong group of athletes — Makayla Hoey, Serena and Alena Woolnough, Olivia Williams, Sunil and Kintan Rasaiah — heading to the JD (junior development for ages 9-13) Championships in Kamloops July 22-24.

Kwalikum Secondary School grad and longtime OTFC standout Thomas Riva was also selected to go to Winnipeg as part of Team BC, and missed the national team by one spot. Now living in Victoria and running for UVic, Thomas just ran a 1:50.9 in the 800m at the Harry Jerome Meet on Canada Day, and is ranked second in Canada for his age.

In other news, OTFC spark-plug Makayla Hoey, 12, just won the B.C. Pentathlon Championships in Surrey last weekend for the fourth straight year. She earned a personal best 2,898 points to claim the all-time B.C. record for 12 year old girls.

Pentathlon is comprised of 800m run, shotput, long jump, high jump, and 80m hurdles. All events are run on the same day.

“It was great ... my 800 was the best all year,” Makayla said trackside at Ballenas Secondary School Wednesday of her winning time of 2 minutes, 28.44 seconds.

“That’s an amazing point total,” marvelled Kim.

The club as a whole, she said, “had a great season with over 100 kids registered again this year. “

The club will know later this summer how it did in the club championship awards.

“These kids are all fabulous kids,” Kim said.

“They give a hundred plus per cent all the time, and for us as coaches, they’re just such a pleasure to spend time with because they’re so dedicated and motivated.”