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PHOTOS: Canada’s best young biathletes competing at Vernon’s Sovereign Lake

Sovereign Lake Nordic Centre hosting Biathlon World Youth Junior Championship Trials Feb. 9-12

Roughly 65 of Canada’s top biathletes have descended on the Sovereign Lake Nordic Centre for the 2022 Biathlon World Youth Junior Championship Trials, for a chance to represent Canada in the sport.

Women’s and men’s junior distance pursuit events took place at the Vernon area centre Thursday, Feb. 10. The youth distance sprints were held Wednesday, and the events will wrap up Saturday with the junior distance sprints.

Three Sovereign Lake athletes competed at home in the junior distance pursuit Wednesday.

Sixteen-year-old Molly Caldwell of Sovereign Lake placed 10th out of 25 in her 10-kilometre event. She said having trained on the uphill portions of the track helped her feel confident while competing.

“The skiing was a little slow but I felt pretty strong in the uphills,” she said.

“My shooting wasn’t great but it was okay,” she added, having hit seven out of 10 targets in the prone position and four of 10 while standing.

Competing in the 12.5 km youth men’s junior distance pursuit, Sebastian Solomonson and Parker Munro began one after the other on the staggered start. The two Sovereign Lake biathletes finished 15th and 19th respectively.

Jenna Sherrington of the Biathlon Alberta Training Centre had the fastest time in the women’s pursuit and was more than a full minute ahead of second place.

Xavier Gilbert of Club de biathlon La Poursuite in Quebec finished first in the youth men’s pursuit, just one tenth of a second ahead of Jean-Nicolas De Broeck, also from Quebec.

There were no local competitors in the junior men’s pursuit, which was won by Logan Pletz of the Whistler Nordic Development Centre (WNDC). Pletz finished more than two minutes faster than the second-place finisher, Zachary Connelly, also from WNDC.

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Brendan Shykora
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Brendan Shykora

About the Author: Brendan Shykora

I started as a carrier at the age of 8. In 2019 graduated from the Master of Journalism program at Carleton University.
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