While the 2006 Olympic Winter Games wrapped up in Italy last Sunday, athletes were putting the wraps on a successful winter games right here in B.C.
The 2006 B.C. Winter Games were held Feb. 23 to 26 in the greater Trail area. The Sunshine Coast was represented in hockey and speed skating.
Pender Harbour's Joe Antilla helped lead the Vancouver-Squamish zone five hockey team to the silver medal.
The U16 team went 3-0 in the round robin with 4-1, 10-2 and 5-2 wins in the preliminary round before losing 3-1 to the Vancouver Island-Central Coast squad in the gold medal game.
Joe scored two goals during the tournament in the preliminary round.
Joe was joined on the team by former Coaster Chad Ketting who now plays in North Vancouver. Ketting grew up in Halfmoon Bay. He was the team's goalie for the tournament.
Following the event, Joe was travelling back to Saskatchewan where he is in his second year continuing his studies and playing hockey at the Athol Murray College of Notre Dame.
"It was a great event," said Joe. "I met a bunch of new friends and played with a lot of guys I played with before when I was still in the Lower Mainland. Gold would have been nice, but I'm still pretty happy we won the silver."
Joe said he's having a great time going to school and playing at Notre Dame. He's playing on the Bantam AAA squad, which is undefeated in league play. They start the playoffs this weekend.
"It's great out here - a great learning experience," he said.
Sechelt speed skater Nicole Maseja also took part in the Games along with her mom Diaya who served as a coach.
Nicole placed eighth in the 500m juvenile girls with a time of 53.72, placed eighth in the 666m juvenile girls with a time of 1:12.51, was 11th in the 777m juvenile girls with a time of 1:26.06 and was 11th in 1000m juvenile girls with a time of 1:54.09.
Even though Nicole didn't win a medal, Diaya said they had a tremendous experience at the Games.
"For a small community like Trail to organize such a great event is truly amazing," said Diaya. "It was both our first time at the Games, so we didn't know what to expect. It was an amazing experience. Nicole skated very well and finished 12th overall. She achieved her goal, which was to skate personal bests in all her distances."
