The St. Tim's Thunder,  Junior High cross country team, closed their season off in fine form at the Athletics Alberta Open Provincial Championships at Canmore Park in Calgary. 

The October 29th championships saw the school team go against some of the best competition the province has to offer in cross country and track & field.

The Thunder team did not disappoint, a team of ten girls came away with a silver medal performance in the bantam girls competition.

The girls team was lead by the silver medal performance by grade 8 student Darci Petersen, followed closely by grade 7 student Sofia Preece in 8th, Holly Moores in 10th, and Grace Boston in 11th.

These four ladies with their top 15 performances sealed a team score of 30 points, which was only bested by the Edmonton Harriers Track Club with a score of 22 points. The school team beat out CALTAF Track Club, University of Calgary Athletic Club, and the Athabasca Nordic Ski Club, among others outside of the top 5 to win the silver medal. 

Also contributing to the win were Miranda Hobbs 19th, Makenna Myatt 20th, Emily Carvalho 24th, Ashtyn Bouillet 27th, Melissa Yeung 29th, and Carling Bremner 34th. 

Travis Cummings, St. Timothy, Cross Country Coach, says the girls did a great job.

"For the most part the girls did pretty awesome, all in all pretty successful for their first real Provincial Championship. They were in with the club competition and showed them that a school base program can compete with the best clubs."

In bantam boys competition, Liam McCollough bounced back from a tough City Championship a few weeks ago and pulled off an 8th place finish for top ten in the province. 

Brenek Spademan also had a strong 23rd place showing in midget boys. And to finish off the results, two St. Timothy's athletes representing the University of Calgary Athletic Club competed as well. Sophia Nowicki, fresh off her silver medal at ASAA provincials, had a bit of an off-day, placing 9th overall in youth girls, and Elspeth Cooper placed 17th in midget girls. 

Cumming says St. Tim's cross country program is unique and one of the only one's offered in the Province this way.

"There really aren't any other programs that give their kids club based competitions, it is a bit a unique situation. It is unique because I coach them from grades 7 -12, so it is not only unique from the perspective that we try to get them the exposure to these types of events but part of it is just the longevity of the time that I spend with them, I coach them for six years."

Travis says his style of coaching is not just about creating great runners now, but evoking a life long passion.

"Part of the advantage of not having a club system is that they are doing it on their own accord. The club system is there for a reason but to be honest in the long term I see more kids quitting the club system as they get older. I want to see them doing it post secondary, I want to see them doing it after."