Team Yukon adds to medal count at Arctic Winter Games

Team Yukon’s medal count continued to climb on day two of the Arctic Winter Games.

Team Yukon’s medal count continued to climb on day two of the Arctic Winter Games.

By early afternoon Tuesday, two gold medals had already been added to the tally.

Team Yukon pushed the medal count from 18 as of Tuesday morning, to 33 as of early this morning.

Rachel and Ben Kinvig dominated in the dog mushing events, with each scoring a gold medal.

Rachel won the 10-km five dog race with a time of 6:42.13, and Ben was first in the 13-km seven dog race with a time of 6:46.30, just two seconds off

Rachel’s time in the shorter distance race.

The 13-km was a tough race for Ben, who finished only eight tenths of a second ahead of Team Alaska’s Yelenna Cavens.

Corey Baxter scored a gold medal in the junior female sledge jump Tuesday with 70 sledges. Following her with a silver was Anna Rivard with 61.

Rivard is dominating the Arctic Sports, winning four silvers so far. Besides the sledge jump, Rivard came into a silver medal position in the two-foot high kick and arm pull events.

Erin Oliver-Beebe added to her medal count as well, winning a silver in the six-kilometre sprint biathlon. She finished the race in 20:33.30.

In the stick pull event, as part of the Dene Games, Tayler Vallevand won a gold medal after defeating Team Alaska’s Christina Glenzel in the semi-finals.

Figure skating gold will be coming home to the Yukon after Bryn Hoffman’s performance in the ladies short program level three.

A silver medal was also won by Teneil Caron in the ladies short program level four.

The final gold earned Tuesday for Team Yukon was in table tennis, with the Yukon defeating Greenland, one of the toughest competitors in the sport.

Donald Fortune won a silver in the 500-metre junior male speed skating event, finishing in a time of 48.6 seconds.

In the same event for juvenile females, Hanna

Wirth earned a bronze with a time of 56.79 seconds.

In the snowboarding banked slalom, Thomas Mills won a bronze medal with a best of three time of 23.63 in the juvenile male division.

A second bronze was added in the same event, in the junior male division by Alexander Chisholme, with a best of three time of 23.34.
The Polarettes and Polar Tumblers Gymnastics Club headed into the Arctic Winter Games with the goal to win a team medal – and they did it Tuesday earning a bronze in the junior female division.

The team, made up of Mackenzie Davy, Lilyanne Gale, Fayne O’Donovan and Caitlyn Venasse, scored 138.1 points together for the third place position.

Coach Catherine O’Donovan, who is in Grande Prairie with the girls, said they are loving the experience so far, according to Jenn Ryan from the club.

The girls got the chance to see the gym they would be performing in ahead of time, and were impressed at the facilities.

“The girls got to see the gym over the past couple of days and they were amazed at the amount of equipment that the club had,” Ryan said. “ There are five trampolines, two different vaulting stations, eight balance beams, four sets of uneven bars as well as four practice bars and they also have three floors.”

Ryan says having access to the gym allowed the girls to get used to it.

“There are practice times available and the girls took advantage of this to familiarize themselves with the different equipment,” Ryan said. “Luckily they adjusted with very few problems.”

Ryan said that after getting used to the new gym, the girls had a great first event.

“There were a few falls which I’m sure they’ll work on for the individual round; however, for the first time competing as a team they did extremely well and they are coming home with the bronze medal,” Ryan said.

“We are so proud of today’s accomplishments and are wishing the team the best of luck for the next meet.”

Monday saw a win for Team Yukon’s midget boys hockey team, but they followed it with a hard fought 1-0 loss against Team Alaska.