York University Lions track and field student-athletes Holly Pitters and Nicholas Fyffe returned home from Edmonton with some hardware from the U SPORTS championships this past weekend.
Pitters, a fourth-year jumper from Mississauga, Ont., struck gold in the long jump event with a distance of 6.14m, just one centimetre off the school record of 6.15m she set earlier this season. The two-time reigning OUA champion came into the event seeded second and was looking for her first national medal after a fourth-place finish last year. She hit 6.14m in the third round and the distance held up as the winning mark after the top seed, Regina’s Joy Becker, came up just short at 6.12m.
In the men’s triple jump, Fyffe, a Vancouver native, also entered the event as the two time defending OUA champion and seeking his first national medal following last season’s fourth-place result. He opened the competition with a season-best 15.00m and pushed himself even further in the second round at 15.10m to sit in first place. Lethbridge’s Aaron Hernandez passed him in the third round and went on to win the gold medal, but Fyffe’s mark was good enough for second place.
Fyffe also competed in the long jump, finishing in eighth place.
Also at the championships, Kayden Johnson finished in fifth place in the heptathlon with 4907 points, while Samuel Adams and Jason Clare were eighth and ninth, respectively, in the pole vault.
In the women’s competition, Christy Ihunaegbo finished in seventh place in the 300m and rookie Kaitlin Brooks recorded a season-best distance of 13.04m in the shot put to finish in the eighth spot. Mikeisha Bobb just missed out on qualifying for the final in the 60m hurdles by finishing in ninth place.
Rounding out the team was the 4x200m relay squad of Ihunaegbo, Bobb, Shania Payne and Courtney Dwyer, which qualified for the final and finished in seventh place.
The Lions women’s team finished in 13th place with 15 points, while the men were 15th with 14 points. The Toronto Varsity Blues won the women’s team title by more than 32 points and the Guelph Gryphons rolled to the men’s banner, finishing 73 points ahead of their nearest rivals.
Women’s Final Standings
- Toronto, 119.50 points
- Guelph, 86.83
- Western, 73
- Alberta, 66
- Calgary, 58.33
- Sherbrooke, 48
- Windsor, 39
- Laval, 27
- Saskatchewan, 21
- Trinity Western, 18.50
- Manitoba, 18
- Regina, 18
- York, 15
- Ottawa, 14
- Queen’s, 9
- Victoria, 6
- Waterloo, 6
- Dalhousie, 5.83
- McGill, 5
- New Brunswick, 4
- Carleton, 4
Final Men’s Standings
- Guelph, 141 points
- Windsor, 68
- Laval, 65.50
- Western, 45
- Toronto, 44
- Alberta, 36
- Lethbridge, 29
- Victoria, 28
- Sherbrooke, 25
- Waterloo, 24
- Dalhousie, 23.50
- Trinity Western, 21
- Carleton, 19
- Manitoba, 18
- York, 14
- Saskatchewan, 13
- Regina, 11
- McMaster, 10
- Calgary, 9
- Ottawa, 8
- Montreal, 6
- St. Francis Xavier, 3