Pembina Valley athletes came home with the hardware from the Special Olympics Canada Winter Games in Calgary last week.
Winkler’s Janell Brown and Rosengart’s Trenten Heinrichs competed in snowshoeing with Team Manitoba at the event. They were joined by coaches Sabrina Klassen (Winkler) and Julia Thiessen (Altona) and mission staff member Chris Sumner (Altona).
Brown came home with three medals in tow: gold in the 100 metre race and bronze in both the 200m race and the 4x100m relay.
She says the experience was “very good” and she was pleased to have done so well after a long gap between this and the last time she competed on the national stage.
“It was very fun,” Brown says, listing “meeting other people” as a highlight for her.
Heinrichs did so well in the preliminaries for his events that he got bumped up a division. He ultimately earned gold in the 4x100m relay and bronze in the 200m race.
While winning the medals was a high point, so too was the camaraderie with Special O athletes from across the country, Heinrichs says.
“I got to meet different people from different provinces,” he says, sharing the Saturday night dance was a lot of fun, as was touring the sights of Calgary.
Coach Thiessen said the Games were a blast for athletes and coaches alike.
“It was really nice to see the relationships built between athletes within our snowshoe team and then the whole Manitoba team as well.”
Team Manitoba included 58 athletes competing in a wide variety of both indoor and outdoor sports. They brought home 60 medals.
It’s been a few years since the nationals could be held, Thiessen notes.
“So just to see people that recognize each other from previous games that they’ve been to from other provinces, to be able to see each other gain, that was neat.”
Competition was high, but so too was the level of support from everyone.
“These athletes have been training three times a week for this since July,” Thiessen says. “So there’s definitely that commitment from the athletes, trying to compete at the best level that they possibly can.
“But it’s also a very supportive environment. People want to be supportive of each other, which really brings out a positive atmosphere.”
Special Olympics Canada will now decide which athletes will represent our nation at the Special Olympics World Winter Games in Turin, Italy next March.
The next national event—the Special Olympics Canada Summer Games—will be held in Medicine Hat, Alberta in 2026. The site of the 2028 Winter Games has not yet been announced.
