Three skaters from the Kelowna Skating Club and Centre of Excellence competed at the Canadian Tire National Figure Skating Championships last week in Mississauga, Ont.
The skaters qualified for the championships by way of placing among the top 18 skaters at their respective levels at the Skate Canada Challenge, held at Regina in December.
The highlight for the Kelowna contingent came in the Novice Women’s event.
Fourteen year-old Julianne Delaurier, an Okanagan Mission Secondary student, capped a strong season with a 104.92 points finish and a bronze medal win. In doing so, Julianne became the first singles skater in Okanagan history to win consecutive medals at nationals,m having won the Pre-Novice title in 2012.
Her club mate, 15 year-old Dana Bobyn, finished in 15th place overall in the field of Canada’s top Novice skaters. This was Dana’s first trip to the Nationals.
At the Junior level, Kelowna’s Cailey England opened in 12th position after the short program in a well-skated event. She came back with a season’s best free program, which included a successful triple lutz combination, in climbing to an 8th place finish overall.
“Having the three girls competing at this event is an incredible feat in itself, much less winning a medal,” said KSC Director Jason Mongrain. “With that said, we have a group of athletes that are pushing each other to greater heights in training, and therefore we can expect the results to get even better in the future.”
