The running of the 5th Annual Drumheller Dinosaur Trail Triathlon saw 49 competitors take to the course to swim, ride and run their way to victory.

The grassroots Drumheller sporting event marked its fifth annual running on Saturday, June 3, and organizer Morgan Syvertsen said it was a great success.

“It was a really good crowd of racers, it was a great race,” he said. 

There were a number of new racers on the course, and a strong contingent from Three Hills, and some as far away as Cochrane. There was a strong group for the valley too, including Sam Brown who won top spot.

“This was his first win, he was second last year, and third the year before, so he is moving up the ladder,” said Syvertsen.

Typically, Syvertsen is able to participate, but this time he volunteered on race day, and was able to appreciate it from a different perspective.

  “It’s small enough that you know everybody, and it is still competitive enough that you know you have done a triathlon,” said Syvertsen. “And I love this course, it’s pretty hard to beat this course.”

As for the future, he sees some growth potential.

“I can see us getting bigger, we never really advertised it yet, this is all word of mouth,” he said.

The Strathmore Spartans Girls Rugby team is just coming off their biggest win of the season. 

On Friday, June 3, the team competed against the Lloydminster Barons in provincials hosted by Lethbridge and won 24-17. 

The team then competed in their second game that day against the F.P Walsh Flyers of Fort Macleod, winning 46-12. 

This moved the team to the final game against the Winston Churchill girls rugby team of Lethbridge. The team played hard but fell to Lethbridge, 46-12. 

The loss of this game did not deteriorate  any  of the girl’s spirit. 

“Just to be a part of that final game was amazing. Lethbridge was highest ranked in the province and to have the opportunity to be matched up with them was a great experience. None of the girls were disappointed with winning silver,” says coach Ryan Hatch. 

Hatch comments that the whole tournament was great to play and a great experience to have the girls watch different tiers of rugby. The team plans to wrap up the season in a couple of weeks to say goodbye to those who are graduating this year. 

Hatch hopes for more girls next season, “Now that we have won silver, we hope that more girls will want to come out and play. If we could even run a sevens team out of Drumheller and still play with Strathmore’s team, that would be huge.”