SHS School to Community class heads to the Olympics

Jeff Green | Jun 01, 2016

The Sydenham High School School to Community class qualified for the provincial school championships, which is put on by Special Olympics Ontario each year at this time.

The team, which is coached by teacher Pietro Cutrona, won a tournament in Kingston two weeks ago and heard last week that they have been invited to compete at the provincial championships, along with 600 other athletes from schools across Ontario. In addition to soccer, competitions in bocce ball, floor hockey, basketball, and track and field will be contested at the three-day event, which takes place in Oshawa this week.

“The students are very excited about going to Oshawa. We are going by train and for some of them it is the first time they have taken the train. Also there are opening ceremonies at the games, which will be exciting, and then there is the competition,” said teacher Karl Hammer, who will be accompanying the students to the games.

After losing out to Regiopolis at the Kingston Area Secondary Schools Athletic Association (KASSAA) final in a 5-4 squeaker on May 19, the Sydenham High School senior girls soccer team regrouped, and less than a week later they were crowned champions of the AA Eastern Ontario Secondary School Athletics Association (EOSSA) soccer championship.

This week, the team is headed to North Bay for the Ontario Federation of School Athletic Associations (OFSAA) finals, which run from today (June 2) until Saturday.

The SHS girls will play at 11 this morning and 3:30 this afternoon, and at 11am and 2:30pm on Friday.

If they survive the round-robin round, they will play in the medal round on Saturday.

EOSSA track and field medalists

A number of SHS athletes finished on the podium at the EOSSA track meet in Kingston last week.

Among the medals there was some gold. Gold medalists included Shirley Hughes in the ambulatory 100 metre dash; Brianna Clow in the I&D 100 metre dash; Simon Cook in the 100 metre men’s midget hurdles event; Jaden Collier in midget men's high jump; and multi-gold medal winner Liam Sands in the Junior men 100 and 300 metre hurdles events.

SHS is sending eight individual athletes and two relay teams to the OFSAA track meet.

SHS EOSSA medalists

Junior women 80 metre hurdles: Brianna Burgess, 3rd 13.09

Junior women 300 metre hurdles: Brianna Burgess, 2nd 49.41

Junior women 4x100 metre relay 3rd 54.48

Ambulatory women 100 metre dash: Shirley Hughes, 1st 17.87

I&D Disabilities women 100 metre dash: Brianna Clow, 1st 16.37

Midget men 100 metre hurdles: Simon Cook, 1st 15.31

Midget men 100 metre hurdles: Nick Vankoughnett, 3rd 15.96

Midget men high jump: Jaden Collier, 1st 1.80 metres

Junior men 100 metre hurdles: Liam Sands, 1st 14.40

Junior men 300 metre hurdles: Liam Sands, 1st 41.65

Junior men 4x100 metre hurdles, 3rd 46.91

Junior men high jump junior: Matt Caird, 2nd 1.65 metres

Senior men 800 metre run: Brady Robertson, 3rd 1:57.50

Senior men 4x100 metre relay: 2nd 44.68

Open men 4x400 metre relay: 3rd 3:31.44

Combined team events: Junior - 3rd place

Combined team scores: Ambulatory - 1st place