Tanner Geary’s four-second personal best in the 800-meters and Vikramjit Gondara’s win in the hammer led Valley Royal performances Saturday at the Emilie Mondor Memorial held on the Simon Fraser University track.
Due to a mix up in the receipt of club entries, Geary was relegated to a weak section of the men’s 800-meters. But instead of mopping about his status, Geary just took the lead, ran an aggressive race and finished first in his section with a time of 1:56.32 and four seconds in front of the second place finisher. In addition, Geary’s time was a four second personal best and preps him for his race next week at the prestigious Oregon Relays in Eugene.
Vikramjit Gondara was not particularly happy with his performance but he still managed very creditable efforts for a 17-year old grade 11 athlete. Throwing the 6kg hammer, Gondara recorded a distance of 54.64 meters in the hammer and followed that with in a toss of 39.60 meters in the discus for a second place finish.
Jayden Driver, who will enter Simon Fraser University next September, had third place finishes in both the hammer (48.94m) and discus (37.20m). Both performances demonstrated that Driver is well positioned to do well at both the upcoming high school provincial meet and then, hopefully, at the BC Athletic Association meets that include the BC Championship Jamboree.
Other medal performances by Valley Royal athletes saw Tasha Willing place second in the shot put (11.94m) and SFU graduate Lindsay Butterworth with a second place (56.35) in the women’s 400 meters, an event won by former Valley Royal athlete Chantel Desch (56.32).
Some good performances by the club’s younger athletes included 15-year old Rachel Mortimer with a second in her section of the 1500m (4:54.92), grade 10 runner Daniel James with a 2:04.64 clocking in the 800m, Kate Sokolowski who placed first in her section of the 800m (2:26.87) and Kristen Biela with a 4:11.75 in the 1500m.
OTHER VALLEY ROYAL PERFORMANCES AT THE MEET:
Hannah Konrad—4th in 400m section 2 (62.42)
Marley Hutchinson—4th in 400m section 1 (64.04)
Josephine Calverly—6th in 400m section 1 (66.38)
Cassidy Hutchinson—2nd in 800m section 1 (2:30.93); 3rd in 400m section 1 (2:30.93)