ORANGE is proving to a be a stronghold for up-and-coming athletes after track and field stars from both Canobolas Rural Technology High School and Orange High School brought home a swag of medals from the recent NSW Combined High Schools Athletics Carnival.
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Competing at the Sydney Olympic Park Athletic Centre over three days from September 4, three students - one from Canobolas and two from Orange High - dominated their respective events.
Canobolas’ Jack Connors brought home an incredible four medals.
A para-athlete, the 14-year-old won three golds in the shot put, discus and 100 metre sprint throwing 9.76m, 23.24m and clocking 14.10 seconds respectively.
Connors also won bronze in the 200m sprint, clocking 27.91 seconds.
“Yeah I expected to do pretty well, I only train once a week but I go hard,” he said.
“It’s a pretty good reward. It’s exciting really (to win three gold medals). I really thought I’d just go down and enjoy it but to get four medals in two days is a huge improvement.”
Nicholas Shield and Keira Edwards, also of Canobolas, both competed as well but finished just outside the placings.
Fellow Canobolas student Erin Naden was also inducted into the Western Region Academy of Sport, for netball.
“It’s a fantastic achievement for Erin,” Canobolas netball coach and PE teacher Amanda Hurford said.
“Erin has come through and played 14s and 15s this season for the school and she’s only in year seven.”
Orange High students Jack Saunders and Andrew Romano made the trip to Sydney as well, competing in the 17 years and over high jump and 12 years boys’ discus respectively.
Both medalled, with Romano bringing home silver after a 31.64m toss, while Saunders cleared 1.85m in the high jump.
“It was raining, and windy and cold so everyone was jumping a lot less than we normally would,” Saunders said.
“We train as much as we can but not really as much as we’d like to, but we’re both pretty excited with the result we’ve got.”
“They’re competing against the Sydney schools, who properly train for it. It’s tough. Neither boys have real athletics backgrounds, so to knock those Sydney teams off is huge,” Western Region athletics convener, and OHS PE teacher Lachlan Butt added.