Northwest athletes came home with 24 medals from the BC Special Olympic Winter Games held in Vernon last month.
From Feb. 21-23, Vernon had more than 600 athletes with intellectual disabilities come from throughout the province to compete in this year’s Winter Games.
Region 7 spans 500 kilometres from the coastal cities of Prince Rupert and Kitimat in the west to Burns Lake in the Lakes District in the east.
The team of 24 athletes from Kitimat, Terrace and Smithers competed in alpine skiing, bowling, curling and snowshoeing.
The Kitimat Kingfishers team of Zack Robinson, Nathan Readman, Theo Jack and Logan Eastman won gold medals in the purple division for curling, beating out the Victoria Capitals, Campbell River Rocks and Kelowna Misfits.
The Terrace Thunder Bowling team came in second in division four of the five-pin bowling championships, coming in 322 points over their 704 pins-over-average score.
Coach Gerald Caouette said this was the first time that the Terrace Special Olympic bowling team qualified to compete in provincials, beating out Smithers in the regional qualifier last year.
Three Terrace athletes also brought home individual gold medals for earning the highest scores.
Other Region 7 athletes representing the Northwest who returned with medals included Luke Smith from Smithers who placed second in the Men’s Advanced Alpine Skiing and third in the Men’s Giant Slalom Skiing.
Smithers snowshoers earned 11 total medals, with Kayle Richter’s silver placements in the first division of the female 100-metre snowshoe with 25.20 seconds, and women’s 200-metre snowshoe at 1 minute, 9.46 seconds.
