THE BEST YOUNG ATHLETES, BAR NONE
Tops 1986 mark in front of boisterous crowd
LARRY WONG, EDMONTON JOURNAL Corey Ma of Old Scona Academy competes Friday in high jump during the 55th annual Alberta Schools Athletic Association track and field championships at Foote Field. For a photo gallery of the event, go to edmontonjournal.com/photos. Story / B3
Tyler Smith’s connection with Mark Lynch is now etched in the record books.
Smith, the No. 2-ranked 800-metre junior runner in Canada, took home gold Friday from the Alberta Schools’ Athletic Association provincial track and field championships at Foote Field, with a record-setting time of 1:51.27, topping Lynch’s 1986 mark of 1:52.50.
“I was scared I didn’t get it and I barely got it. I wanted to go faster, but it is what it is. I still got it and I can’t complain,” an exhausted Smith said moments after the race.
The Wetaskiwin Composite High School product needed every ounce of support he received from the boisterous crowd to secure the record, as Smith led from start to finish, winning by more than seven seconds.
“The only thing that brought me through was knowing that the crowd cared about me,” Smith said. “To know there’s somebody watching … that’s one of the big things. If no one is watching, why are you going to push yourself?
“It’s the other people that pull you through.”
For public address announcer Gord Lindsay, longtime voice of track and field in Alberta, getting the crowd into the race was the least he could do to help Smith.
“When he talked to me (before the race), he asked me if I could help get the crowd involved today, because he was going for the record and knew he would be running on his own,” said Lindsay, who works from track level.
“He was getting choked up and actually, I was feeling a little emotional as well, because when I announce and when I’m down here, I get to interact. It’s fine being in a booth, but you just don’t have that same connection with athletes.”
Smith’s historic run on a picture-perfect day was the second straight year he etched his name in the record books, after the Grade 11 student took the intermediate boys record last year in his first year of high school.
Smith and Lynch — who has since passed away — aren’t only connected by the records they set, but also by coach John Bole from the Leduc Track Club.
Bole helped guide Lynch to his record run in 1986 and now, 26 years later, has another record-setter in Smith.
While Smith, who has only been running for three years, never met Lynch, their coach sees the similarities.
“In many ways they’re very similar in attitude,” Bole said of Smith and Lynch. “Relatively humble, not braggarts. You’ll never hear Tyler bragging about his performances. He lets other people do it for him, and Mark was always the same.”
Lindsay also sees connections between the two runners.
“I saw Mark Lynch and he was an outstanding talent, too, in his day,” Lindsay said. “Unfortunately, he passed away long before his time, but he was a fabulous runner and another outstanding runner has taken down his record.”
With another record under his belt, Smith will turn his attention to an upcoming trip to the west coast where he’ll be competing in the Harry Jerome International Track Classic on June 10, which is part of the National Track League.
“It’s very unusual that a high school kid is even invited. I’ll be racing the pre-Jerome meet and then the Harry Jerome meet in Vancouver. That’s a very high level meet,” Smith said.
“If I can do well there, I’ll also be invited to go to the University of Victoria to go to thei r university international meet, so if I can go to those, that would be really interesting.”
For Smith, whose personal best time in the 800m is 1:49.20, the Harry Jerome meet could be just another stop on the way to Barcelona, Spain this summer for the world junior championships, where the country’s top two 800m runners will don the Maple Leaf.
While Bole and Smith had been hoping for a time closer to 1:50 on Friday, Smith’s record time was far from a letdown for an athlete who hasn’t even hit his stride yet.
“I used to just go to events like this in Grade 9 to get the day off school, but now I’ve learned that there’s a lot of passion involved,” Smith said.
The ASAA provincial track and field championships continue Saturday at Foote Field. Competition begins at 9 a.m. and concludes just before 3 p.m. with the 4x100m finals.