Thank you very much to Ottawa Orienteering for presenting the Ottawa Sports Pages’ XC Week! Orienteering is like cross-country running, with a few extra exciting twists and turns. Find out about the adventure that awaits you here.
By Dan Plouffe
Onyx and Zain Sineus can now officially say those speed training sessions they took to boost their quickness on the basketball court have paid off, although not quite the way they initially expected.
The twin brothers from Canterbury High School made a fast break from the field in the novice boys’ 4 km race at the national capital high school cross-country running championships on Oct. 24 at Walter Baker Park in Kanata, finishing first and second respectively.
Onyx cruised in with a time of 15 minutes, 17.1 seconds, while Zain charged in at 15:30.8 to beat bronze medallist Brody Charbot of St. Francis Xavier by 1.4 seconds.
“We weren’t fast in basketball,” recalled Onyx, who was an Eastern Ontario champion with the Gloucester-Cumberland Wolverines several years ago. “We were pretty slow, so we started track basically to help prepare us in basketball.”
The summer after they finished Grade 6, the Sineus siblings started training with CANI Athletics, and now their athletic focus has shifted to running.
“We loved basketball, but track and running loved us more,” smiled Zain, who wasn’t among the tallest runners in the race, let alone among cagers.
On top of the success they’ve found in their new pursuit, Zain said that it’s easier to see his improvements in running than in basketball.
The 400 and 800m track events are the Sineus bread and butter, and they look at cross-country running as a good opportunity to improve their fitness in the fall. The sport provides a little extra motivation following the summer track season, and a different challenge with its varied terrain.
“Cross-country courses are more interesting,” Zain indicated. “You get the scenery, and you get to race as well.”
The multi-talented athletes both felt like they got a taste of another different sport entirely at the city finals, when the start resembled a boxing match the way they were jostled for a place at the front of the pack.
“I made sure that I could see my brother. I needed to come second place. Last week (at the east conference meet), I came fourth place, so I needed it to be better this week,” Zain added. “I trained really hard for this and I made sure not to give up.”
Onyx was also pleased to see his brother make it a 1-2 finish for the Sineus clan.
“It’s supposed to be this way,” he underlined. “I was wondering where he was last week, but he came through this week, so that’s good.”
Garneau wins team title by 1 point, Glebe edges Canterbury for surprise final OFSAA berth
The top spot in the team competition was decided by a single placement point as Garneau edged Colonel By 62-63.
The Garneau lineup included Antony Gerges (fourth place), Noah Deveau (sixth), Maxime Cazabon (20th), Benjamin Mantha (32nd) and Cedrick Laurin (58th), while Noah Vanderheide (eighth), Callum Alderson (16th), William Saikaly (17th), Finley Librach (22nd) and Apollo Sun (67th) make up Colonel By’s troops bound for the Nov. 4 OFSAA provincial championships.
“We’re super happy. To win by one point, it’s something super big for us,” signalled Garneau lead runner Gerges. “OFSAA, from what I’ve heard, is a massive one. I’m very excited.”
Like the Sineus brothers, Gerges is another athlete who would have been a longshot to be found at the top of the running results sheet back when he was taking his first strides in the sport.
When he was in elementary school, Gerges realized many sports required running, so that helped pull him to XC.
“I was never good. I was always last place, finishing 2 km in 30 minutes or so,” Gerges recounted. “I wanted to prove others wrong, and I wanted to prove to myself that I’m not slow. I can do this if I dedicate myself to it.”
Only two Garneau teams earned points for top-8 finishes at the meet, but both scored a perfect 10 as champions (the junior girls were the other), which catapulted the Gaulois to fourth in the overall aggregate scoring.
Gerges said Garneau has a great group of runners, and that he was grateful to have received many great tips from more senior athletes on the team as well as his coaches.
Immaculata earned the third spot on the team podium thanks to the performances of Graham Polman (10th), Colden Davies (14th), Aleks Scullion (24th), Connor Mathurin (35th) and Jackson Gard (38th).
As OFSAA hosts, the national capital association receives twice as many entries as it would for an away championships. The four schools with the lowest team score in each division (calculated by adding their top 4 runners’ placings) at the city finals qualified five runners each, while the 10 best individuals who didn’t qualify with their teams secured their place on the provincial start line as well.
The race for the last team qualification position proved to be exceptionally tight, with Glebe ultimately getting the nod.
Nicolas Behrend (who finished 49th), backed up by Clark Whatley (in 50th), registered the decisive points to edge Canterbury 116-118 for the last OFSAA team ticket. Myles Durant and Elliot Moulds also finished on each other’s heels in 27th and 28th, while Theo Hurst jumped up from 20th place at the east conference championships to lead the way for Glebe in 12th at the cities.
“We really knew that every person on our team had to push forward and I think every person did,” highlighted Behrend, whose squad had only placed fifth at the conference meet. “It was a fun race and I’m happy that we made OFSAA. I hadn’t expected that, so I’m super excited.”
Behrend is looking forward to racing on a course he knows at Mooney’s Bay, and also to follow in his uncle’s footsteps as an OFSAA XC participant.
“It’s pretty cool. My uncle raced OFSAA a few times,” noted Behrend, although most would recognize his mom’s brother as a legendary Canadian triathlete – Olympic gold and silver medallist Simon Whitfield.
The Glebe runners knew that the team competition would be their top avenue to OFSAA, and kept that in mind while on course.
“I didn’t really know who was ahead of us, but I did know that every person you pass could affect that score,” explained Behrend, who got sapped by the toboggan hill climb and slowed a little before picking up the pace again.
“I had a Glebe teammate behind me, pushing forward, so I just continued to push forward,” he recounted. “My goal was to not let anybody pass me.”
Joining the Sineus brothers and Charbot as individual novice boys OFSAA qualifiers are Paul-Desmarais’s Evan Theriault (fifth), Hillcrest’s Sam Hayes (seventh), All Saints’ Declan McGinnity (ninth), Longfields-Davidson Heights’ Isa Amer (11th), Ottawa-Carleton Virtual’s Mizan Akbari (13th), Merivale’s Max Rosher (15th) and St. Joseph’s Morgan Taylor (18th).
The Ottawa Sports Pages will be posting recaps and photo galleries race-by-race each weekday from Oct. 25-Nov. 1 leading into the 2024 OFSAA XC Championships. Find them all on our XC Week webpage, presented by Ottawa Orienteering.
NCXC24 Novice Boys’ Photo Gallery
Photos by Zach Sikka, sikkasnapshots.com
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