Fantastic foursome leads medal charge

Tim Switzer, The Leader-Post

PHOTO CREDITS: Don Healy, Regina Leader-Post: TOP: Team Saskatchewan coaches Jonny Johnson (top left) and Ron Gonzales (top right) and members of the woman's wrestling team celebrate their success;  Joshua Sawka, The Leader-Post: MIDDLE: Annie Quangtakoune (from left), Jasmine Slinn, Allysa Krahn and Pamela Ewanishin lead Saskatchewan's medal haul in women's wrestling. BOTTOM: Saskatchewan's Allysa Krahn was jumping for joy after winning gold.

August 19, 2005  The lightweights carried a heavy load for Saskatchewan's women's wrestling team this week.

And in the end, they all walked away with some hardware.

In addition to the team gold they won Wednesday night at the Canada Summer Games, Saskatoon's Pamela Ewanishin (52-kilogram weight class) and Allysa Krahn (48 kg) earned gold medals in the women's individual competition Thursday.

Jasmine Slinn (44 kg) added a silver and Annie Quangtakoune (40 kg), also from Regina, won bronze.

As the four lightest girls on the team, they train together, are rooming together at the athletes' village and have developed a close bond.

"The four of us, we've always got along together really well," said Krahn. "When you're together and sharing a (dorm room) here and you're spending all this time here and travelling down to the States, you just get really close. We're just always there for each other."

Krahn and Ewanishin, both 18, have also taken on the role as mentors to Quangtakoune, 16, and Slinn, 15.

"Allysa and I are veterans and I think we push the two girls who are lighter than us," said Ewanishin. "I think we did pretty well in training them and brought them up to our level. They've improved so much over the summer, I can't believe how well they did."

"I guess we're more experienced than them so we like to support them and give them advice whenever we can just to help them so our team can be as good as it possibly can," added Krahn.

For Quangtakoune, seeing her teachers come out on top was almost as special as winning her own medal.

"Pam and Allysa are both national champions and for me and Jasmine just to have the chance to train with them and be on the same team has been amazing," she said. "And for them to win a gold medal here with us is just tremendous. It's just a great opportunity to be here with them."

Slinn said having Ewanishin and Krahn there for her has stepped up her game.

"They're older and more experienced," she said. "It's helped me a lot."

Saskatchewan coach Kim Bergey Kaip said those four have a tough role and have brought a lot to the team during the entire competition.

"There's a lot of pressure on them in the dual meets because they start the trend, they've got to start off strong," she said. "They've come out and they've performed every match. Today they came away with the four medals so that's great for them.

"Jasmine is just starting out, Annie too," she added. "They have a future."

Not that the middle and heavyweights were slacking off.

Regina's Samantha McKay (75kg and over), Saskatoon's Stephany Dergo (56kg) and Saskatoon's Beth Thompson (75kg) added silver medals and Regina's Nicole Daum (65kg) earned a bronze, bringing the women's team total to eight individual medals -- two gold, four silver and two bronze.

In all, out of the 10 weight classes, Saskatchewan women were fighting for nine of them. Sarah Mercer lost out in the 70kg bronze-medal match and Caileigh Beckman, also from the Queen City, finished fifth in the 60kg weight class.

"A chance to get nine medals out of the 10, it's awesome," Bergey Kaip said.

Additional content from Saskatoon StarPhoenix

BODNARCHUK GETS GOLD

In men's wrestling, Mitch Bodnarchuk of Saskatoon led a five-medal parade by the Saskatchewan team with a gold in the 58-kilogram division.

Daniel Olver (74 kg) of Saskatoon won silver and Spencer Adams (63 kg) of Saskatoon, Calvin Daum (68 kg) of Regina and Bryan Blackwell (50 kg) of Saskatoon won bronze.

Chris Hobman (81 kg) of Saskatoon, Kirk Ackerman (46 kg) of Regina and Ryan Myrfield (54 kg) of Saskatoon were fourth.

© The Leader-Post (Regina) 2005.