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Pictured Above: BRITTANEE LAVERDURE

Laverdure places 12th at worlds

It wasn’t the result she was looking for at worlds, but Brittanee Laverdure remains excited for the future.

By Whitehorse Star on September 12, 2014

It wasn’t the result she was looking for at worlds, but Brittanee Laverdure remains excited for the future.

The Watson Lake wrestler finished this week’s Senior World Championships in Tashkent, Uzbekistan ranked 12th in the world.

Coming off a silver medal at the Commonwealth Games in July, Laverdure had high hopes for the Senior World Championships.

Competing in the women’s 55-kilogram class, Laverdure opened with a 6-0 win over Czech wrestler Lenka Hockova Wednesday, before losing 3-0 to Russia’s Irina Ologonova and 8-4 to Spain’s Karima Sanchez in repechage.

Ologonova went all the way to the finals before losing to Japan’s Chiho Hamada.

“Obviously, it’s not the end result I was hoping for on the day,” the 32-year-old told the Star. “But I do have a sense of excitement building, moving forward into 2015.

“I realize we are all human and we have good days and bad. I lost to the silver medallist, who ended 4-3 in the final against the winner from Japan.

“I made errors I can improve on. To me, that’s exciting because I know it was not my best performance and I have room to build, even with the disappointment of a loss.”

As a whole, Team Canada did not do as well as hoped, Laverdure said.

“We have been in the top eight countries in the world for as long as I can remember (and) we were off the podium in almost every weight class,” she noted.

Laverdure said her ultimate goal continues to be representing Canada at the Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 2016.

She acknowledged battling some nagging injuries the past few months.

“I didn’t want to press them with a timeline surrounding worlds,” Laverdure said.

Competition will continue this fall for the five-foot-three, 127-pound wrestler, who currently works as a lawyer in Calgary.

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