Saints 11th at OFSAA
St. Peter senior boys team races to fourth at snowy OFSAA cross country championships
The St. Peter Saints cross country running team posted its strongest results in recent memory at OFSAA on Saturday.
The Saints senior boys team placed fourth of 36 teams overall and the senior girls 10th overall in Petawawa.
It helped lead St. Peter to an 11th place overall standing. The previous best results for the Saints boys was a seventh for the junior team two years ago and a 13th for the girls as juniors two years ago. OFSAA is the third largest high school meet in North America.
Adam Scott’s Molly Strain had the best finish among Peterborough athletes placing ninth overall in the midget girls race. Strain was 28.2 seconds behind the gold medallist. The top local boy was St. Peter’s Tristen Jones who finished 17th in the senior boys race.
It was the best results by St. Peter since Nil Lavallee began coaching the team nine years ago and was joined by his wife Christine four years ago. The Lavallees were running stars in their youth growing up in Timmins. Nil was an OFSAA cross country champion, an All-American distance runner at Eastern New Mexico University an OUA champion at Laurentian University and represented Canada at two world cross country championships. Christine was an OUA champion at Laurentian and a Canadian marathon record holder. Their daughter Rachel Seaman is an Olympian and Canada’s most decorated racewalker.
The couple recognized they had a special group of athletes and this year really kicked up their training.
“They bought into the program and were willing to put the work in,” Nil Lavallee said. “This group knew what it took to get to where they wanted to be so they put in the work.”
He said they got the athletes to buy into year-round training, not just the two months leading up to OFSAA.
“They knew after last year they could be medal contenders,” he said. “There were some unofficial rankings all season that put us in the top five. On any given day they could have medalled.”
Christine Lavallee said the team trained five days a week with hill climbs on Monday, races or intense workouts on Wednesday and a long run or tempo run on Friday with lighter recovery runs on Tuesday and Thursday.
“It’s been ramping up every year,” Christine said. “They were able to do it because of their background. This is the fourth year we’ve had these boys and we’ve brought them along a little bit each year.”
Nil said many of the top running schools have a culture they’ve tried to foster at St. Peter.
“When you have a culture and a tradition kids who come in aren’t starting from scratch. They see what the older kids are doing,” he said.
The Lavallees, who celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary this year, are in their early sixties and nearing retirement. They’d like to see the tradition carry on but Nil said they’ve likely got one more cross country season in them before retirement. Quite a few athletes are returning next year including Jones although three boys and two girls will graduate off the senior teams. It’s realistic, he said, to think both senior teams could compete for top 10 positions again next year.
In addition to Jones, other results from the Saints senior boys included Gustav Finley at 46th, despite battling injuries all season, Liam O’Connor 136th, Jack Chambers 137th, who was ill on race day, and Matt Cottam 177th.
The Saints senior girls results included Ella Clarke 68th, Destiny Robitaille106th,TaraBlack113thand Brieanna Keast 126th. Crestwood’s Sarah Thackeray placed 139th.
The Saints junior girls team placed 17th overall with Audrey McCarthy placing 68th, Maddie Gordon 88th, Sandra Taskovic 161st and Maya Taylor 219th. Crestwood’s Grace DeHann placed 106th, Kenner’s Anna Deleenheer 112th and Adam Scott’s Allison Westbroek 115th.
The Saints junior boys team placed 18th with Jake Douglas finishing 69th, Isaac White 93rd, Patrick Tompkins 167th, Braydon Robitaille 231st and Sam Gunter 242nd.