GALLERY: Endurance Project athletes medal at provincials

Athletes of the Cochrane Endurance Project (CEPR) beat expectations of their head coach in last weekend's Athletics Alberta Age Class Provincials in Sherwood Park.

Of the eight CEPR athletes, two returned as provincial champions, two others medalled and many recorded best personal times in the club's last major meet of the season.

Csenia Irvin won gold in the U20 women's 800m in the second fastest time of the season, finished sixth in the 400m and fifth in the 1,500m.

Kayley Torrie smashed her personal best (PB) by seconds in the U18 women's 1,500m on her way to a gold medal with a time of 4:44.08. She placed fourth with a PB 2:21 in her first 800m of the season.

"We were doing it (800m) just for prep for Westerns, because she's doing the 1,500 and 3k, so she needed to do something a bit shorter this weekend, but the 1,500 was amazing," says CEPR head coach Travis Cummings. "She had a 10 second PB and battled with second place. She won by a 10th of a second, it was very cool."

U19 men's athlete Raimo Sollitt won silver in a neck-to-neck finish in the 2k Steeplechase beating his PB by 10 sec. with a 6:31.84. He came sixth in the 3,000m.

"That was a really competitive steeple, too," says Cummings. "That one went down to the wire, and he was second by 200th of a second. It was crazy. It was the most competitive steeple race I've seen in the longtime."

It was an important day for Golden Bears athlete Clay Grattidge, who met national qualifying times in both the U20 800m and senior 400m senior. He won bronze in the U20 men's 400m and was fifth in the senior men's 800m.

Jacob White placed 8th in the senior men's 1,500m with a PB of 4:08.67, and 10th in the 800m with a PB 1:58.15.

Ryden Bruce was 5th in the U16 Men's 1,500m Steeple with a PB of 5:14, and 11th in the 2,000m with a PB 6:49.84.

In U18 women's, Zoelia Labonte was 16th in the 800m and 14th in the 1,500m.

Also in U18 women's, Avlea Irvin came 20th with a PB 2:53.03 PB and 17th in the 1,500m.

Head coach Cummings says he was in impressed with the performance of their athletes.

"Looking at the PBs, those are really big drops this late into the season because sometimes we're getting close to being burned out at this time of the year so it can be really good or really bad, but for the most part, people ran big PBs, so clearly what we're doing programming wise is working."

He says it's a great way to wrap up the season until training resumes in September.

"They rocked high school provincials and we've got a lot of extra help with the coaching staff, so it's a lot more sustainable program."

The season isn't quite over for two of their athletes, though. Kayley Torrie will be representing CEPR at the Western Canadian Challenge as part of Team Alberta July 19-21 in Winnipeg, MB. And Eddie MacMillan will be representing CEPR in U16 at the Legion National U16/U18 Championships in Calgary Aug 9-11.

In the fall, several CEPR athletes will be returning to their varsity teams or joining new ones. Clay Grattidge will report to the UAlberta Golden Bears for his sophomore season, and Jacob White will be returning for a sophomore year of eligibility with the USask Huskies.

Irvin is entering her rookie season with the UCalgary Dinos and Caden Jones will be joining the University of New Brunswick Reds. Ellie Barlow will be competing in her rookie season for the Medicine Hat Rattlers.