Thompson’s Dennita Cameron will represent Manitoba at the Canada Summer Games in Winnipeg after winning the women’s youth high jump at the Manitoba provincial age class championships in Winnipeg June 23-24.
Cameron, who won a silver medal in the junior varsity high jump at the Manitoba high school provincials in 2016, when she was in Grade 9, jumped a personal outdoor best of 1.65 metres to win her category, clearing a height almost 20 centimetres higher than the second-place finisher.
The 16-year-old didn’t compete in high school track this school year but did take part in three indoor events, including the indoor national championships in Montreal in February and an Athletics Manitoba event in March, where she cleared a personal-best 1.69 metres.
Cameron, who is over six feet tall, says she thinks she has grown in the past year and also credits practising with a coach in Winnipeg for improving her technique and helping her increase her personal best height by more than 10 centimetres since 2016.
“I think the practice has made a big difference,” she says, as has getting more competitions under her belt. “I’m more calm during the meets. I don’t freak out as much and get anxious jumping around these girls.”
The summer will feature plenty of competition for Cameron, who is competing in the tri-province meet in Winnipeg July 13-14 and as a member of Manitoba’s volleyball team at the North American Indigenous Games in Toronto before returning to Manitoba for the Canada Summer Games and then competing at the Legion track nationals in Brandon in August.
Although she will know some of the competitors she’ll be up against at the Canada Summer Games and is usually taller than the people she’s jumping against, Cameron knows she’ll have to up her game against top athletes from all across Canada.
“I feel like they’re going to be more intense because I’ve moved up an age group,” she says.
And while she doesn’t get a great deal of training time in Thompson, though Shaun Kennedy sometimes opens up the school gym for her to practise, Cameron feels she can still improve and plans to go back to competing in high school track and field next school year as a Grade 11.
“I feel like I can still jump higher if I train more down south and keep competing in the meets to improve,” she said.
Six other Thompson athletes also competed at the age class championships in June, including Jonna McDonald, who was second in the youth women’s shot put and the youth women’s discus, and Jack Kennedy who was fifth in the 18- and19-year-old men’s 400 metres and ninth in the 100-metre preliminaries. Other Thompson competitors were Carissa Kennedy (13th in the midget women’s 300 metres and fourth in the midget women’s high jump), Rhys Zimmerman (11th in the peewee men’s 80 metres), Drew Zimmerman and Aiden Zimmerman (17th in the midget men’s 100 metres, 13th in the midget men’s 200 metres and 12th in the midget men’s 300 metres).
