If Lambrick Park secondary school’s track and field team had any more athletes this year they would have needed a third car to get around.
With just nine athletes at the B.C. High School Track and Field Championships, held June 3 and 4 in Burnaby, Lambrick Park didn’t carry a big team. But its performance will go down in history as one of the school’s best.
“It’s going to be remembered, that’s for sure,” coach Tom Turnbull said.
“We’re the first school ever to sweep all four boy’s throwing events. It’s a special group of athletes.”
Senior Adam Keenan led the powerful outfit to second overall at in the team standings, behind local powerhouse Oak Bay High.
Keenan won gold in the shot put and hammer while setting a new provincial discus record of 56.26 metres.
Keenan’s cousin Mason Kereszti, a Grade 11 student, took gold in the javelin and bronze in the discus. Kereszti’s elder brother Matt took bronze in the hammer, while teammate Taryn Gmitroski won silver in the girls javelin and placed fourth in the discus.
Next year, Kereszti has a chance to win three golds of his own as he adds the shot put, while returning as a favourite to repeat in the javelin and discus. With many of his teammates graduating, Kereszti is looking forward to a little more of the spotlight next year.
“It’s a competitive training group and I’ll miss them but not too much,” Kereszti said, adding he’ll have to lean more on his training partners at Pacific Athletics.
Hammering out a future
This summer Matt Kereszti plans to continue training in Victoria with Pacific Athletics while Gmitroski is headed to the University of North Carolina to study and play NCAA Div. II volleyball.
Keenan is on course to compete in the junior nationals in Winnipeg this summer and to earn grant money from Athletics Canada.
“It’s kind of becoming a job,” he said.
As for Keenan’s post-secondary plans, it’s not as if his gold medals and provincial records went unnoticed. Interest from the NCAA and CIS came in the mail from schools as near as Washington State University, Simon Fraser University and Lethbridge, and as far as Dartmouth and Louisiana.
Instead, Keenan has chosen to pursue an opportunity closer to home and will train with elite Canadian coach Dr. Anatoly Bondarchuk in Kamloops.
“I’ll be focusing on the hammer while I study at Thompson Rivers University,” Keenan said.
It’s a jump to the top for Keenan, who will immediately train alongside Canadian Olympian Dylan Armstrong.
Perhaps it’s fitting as the provincial discus record Keenan just beat was previously set by Armstrong in 1999.
Surprisingly, the discus is neither Keenan’s nor Armstrong’s specialty.
“There’s a throwing career ahead of me, just not in the discus,” said Keenan, joking about the fact the most successful in the discus internationally tend to be six-foot-seven or taller.
Lions in the field
Lambrick’s Lucas Dellabough (Grade 11) and D.J. Weirmier (Grade 12) finished eighth and 13th, respectively, in the decathlon.
Dellabough also raced the 100m and 200m sprints, having made the standards at Islands and will back next year looking for a podium finish in the decathlon.
Uriah Schwabe (shot put), Sean Kelly (high jump), Kevin Kuo (1,500m race walk) and Caleb Thumm (1,500m race walk) also competed for Lambrick at the provincials.