Sydney De La Mare of the St. Albert Rugby Football Club is among 24 athletes selected to play for Canada’s U18 women’s team during a tour of England in April.
Canada will scrum down against England’s U18 side twice in five days at Bicton College in Devon.
Canada’s roster is comprised of nine players from Ontario, seven from B.C., six from Alberta and one each from Nova Scotia and Manitoba.
De La Mare made the U17 Canada long list of 60 females for a week-long camp in Kingston, Ont. last October in preparation to finalize the U18 touring side. Five different regional camps were then staged in late January and early February before the squad was declared.
De La Mare is a Grade 12 rugby player for the Paul Kane Blues who also plays ringette with the St. Albert Mission U19AA belles.
Next month De La Mare and Alexie Pusch, a SARFC product who recently accepted a scholarship from the Shawnigan Lake School Rugby Academy, will compete for U18 Team Alberta at the Vancouver 7s tournament.
De Le Mare played eight-man and Pusch was a standoff for the SARFC U19 juniors, last year’s Edmonton Rugby Union finalists.
The Alberta Winter Games ended Tuesday in Medicine Hat for more than 1,800 developing athletes 11 to 17 years old.
Medals were awarded in alpine skiing, archery, artistic gymnastics, badminton, biathlon, boxing, cross-country skiing, curling, fencing, figure skating, freestyle skiing, female hockey, male hockey, judo, ringette, snowboarding, speed skating, squash, synchronized swimming, volleyball and wrestling during the four-day competition.
The following athletes and coaches were listed on the Alberta Games website at www.albertagames.com as medal winners from St. Albert and area with Zone 5 (Black Gold/Yellowhead) or with one of the other eight zones in the province.
Rylan Baerg, wrestling: silver, all-around team; bronze, male 76 kilograms.
Jillian Basterash, ringette: gold.
Makenna Benedict, artistic gymnastics, JO 6 level: bronze, all-around team and bars.
Payden Bialowas, female hockey: gold.
Alice Boddez, ringette: gold.
Reid Bokenfohr, cross-country skiing: bronze, 11-12 mini-midget mixed relay.
Declan Cayanga, wrestling: silver, all-around team and male 47 kg.
Mia Cowper, cross-country skiing: bronze, 15-16 juvenile female relay.
Bria Fewchuk, female hockey: gold.
Kylie Foisy, female hockey: gold.
Nicholas Gagnon (Sturgeon County) judo: bronze, male 45 to 50 kg.
Hobbes Holzer, speed skating: gold, 13-14 (T2T 2) male relay.
Anatonia Hood, ringette: gold.
Mykenzie Howard, ringette: gold.
Brooklyn Johnson, ringette: gold.
Sabrina Kelly, wrestling: silver, all-around team.
Vail Ketsa (Sturgeon County), ringette: gold
Heather Konkin, ringette: gold.
Isabelle Lajoie, female hockey: gold.
Cole Lamoureux (Calahoo), alpine skiing: gold, U14 male slalom AM Race 1 and PM Race 2.
Libby Langenhahn, female hockey: gold.
Madeleine Lovsin, ringette: gold.
Chris Manchester, wrestling: silver, all-around team.
Lauren Miller (Sturgeon County), ringette: gold.
Seth Nobert, judo: gold, male 40 to 45 kg.
Taylor Ostafichuk, ringette: gold.
Kennedy Palmer, ringette: gold.
Danielle Petter, ringette: gold.
Jenna Rattray (Dynamyx Gymnastics Club), artistic gymnastics, JO 7 level: bronze, all-around team.
Adele Romanin (St. Albert Skating Centre), figure skating: bronze, juvenile U12/U14 combined women’s singles.
Makenna Schuttler, female hockey: gold.
Robyn Short, female hockey: gold.
Ryiah Siffledeen, ringette: gold.
Paige Skogstad, synchronized swimming: gold in duet with Bethany Smith of Leduc.
Ellery Sopko, ringette: gold.
Paige Squires, ringette: gold.
Emma Sundar, female hockey: gold.
Katelynn Wagner, female hockey: gold.
Zone 3 (Calgary) was awarded the Alberta Cup for achieving the most medal points and Zone 5 received the Minister’s Cup for showing the greatest improvement from one Alberta Games to the next.
The 2016 Alberta Summer Games are July 14 to 17 in Leduc.
