NBIAA Provincials Recap

As the 2023 NBIAA track & field season has come to an end this past Saturday, let's take a look back at some of the most interesting and impressive moments of this year's championships.

To kick things off, we saw a great comeback story in the junior girls sprints. After only coming in third at regionals in 100m & 200m, Maude Camille Basque flipped a switch and managed to win both events when it mattered most. 

On the boys side in the junior 3000m, we saw Samuel Lepage just barely lose at regionals by only 0.6 seconds after an entire 7.5 lap race! At provincials though it was a different story, Samuel came back with a vengeance, ran 27 seconds faster in terrible weather, and took the win convincingly.

If you’re a fan of the field events, there were lots of close finishes on Saturday, namely in the girls long jump where Elisha Deplhin won by only 3cm in the junior section, and Mallie Kilfoil won by only 5cm in the senior section. Then in the senior boys high jump, the top three all jumped 1.55m, meaning Tyler Wilson took the win by having the least previous failed attempts. Finally in the senior girls shot put, the top 3 were only separated by 3cm, it was Jacey Calder who came out on top.

Back on the track, perhaps the most upsets came out of the junior boys category where all flat running events, 100m to the 3000m, each had a different winner, the only category in which this happened. 

As opposed to previous years, the relay powerhouse schools were not as dominant as before, we saw the 8 relay titles go to 6 different schools. On top of that, three of the winners actually came from the AA division, Woodstock High School, Bonar Law High School, and Carleton North High.

If you want to talk about dominance, you have to mention Anna Somers and Isaac MacLean. In 2022, they both won their three individual events, 100m, 200m, 400m for Anna and 800m, 1500m, 3000m for Isaac. In 2023, they came back and won all three, again, for a total of six golds each. With Anna only being in grade 11 this year, can she do it all over again next year? We think so.

There might’ve only been a few triple winners, but there sure was lots of double winners so we’ll highlight those people too; Felicia Mortimer, Juliana Lemaire, Ava Brennan, Ariane Noël Bertin, Nicole trites, Mallie Kilfoil, Marie-Ève Maillet, Breilan Levi Labobe, Everett Kent, Jackson Banks, Jack Mellish, and Aidan Boleyn. 

A huge congratulations to all athletes who competed, we already can’t wait for next year!