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Newsletter by Keiran Gorsky, Tyler Reis-Sanford, Dan Plouffe & Farrah Philpot
The mischievous climate in Newfoundland had a few more tricks up its sleeve on the penultimate day of the 2025 Canada Summer Games. The wind chill dipped to a biting 5°C in the morning with gusts approaching 40 km/h. It brought its share of cheer and chagrin for Ottawa track and field athletes, who will leave St. John’s with medals of every colour from Saturday’s action.
All five Ottawa athletes competing in track and field at the Fortis Canada Games Complex on Saturday won medals – seven of them in total thanks to a pair of relay teammates and a double-podium day from Will Batley.
Reigning senior men’s high jump champion Thomas Sénéchal-Becker won a chess match of bar-maneuvering hijinks as well as the Canada Games gold medal.
The CANI Athletics competitor certainly knows his numbers. When the stadium announcer misstated his personal-best performance as 2.07 metres, he loudly set the record straight.
“Not true!” Sénéchal-Becker shouted out to the crowd.
The 22-year-old past U Sports champion for the University of Ottawa Gee-Gees in fact jumped 2.17 m at an Ontario University Athletics event in 2023.
And so, he was justly startled when he twice consecutively failed to clear 2.06 m in the bitter cold.
“My legs felt terrible,” recounted Sénéchal-Becker, who indicated this was the coldest weather he had ever jumped in. “My tendons felt stiff, not elastic, not bouncy.”
Thomas Sénéchal-Becker. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
Late in the afternoon, the only three jumpers remaining in the competition were Sénéchal-Becker, his provincial teammate Tristan Boateng and Manitoba’s Zandre Castello. Castello failed to clear the mark thrice in a row, but Boateng managed it on his second try.
That’s when Sénéchal-Becker made the gusty gutsy move to raise the bar to 2.08 m on his final attempt. This, in effect, killed two birds with one stone. If he cleared it, which he knew he was capable of, he would avoid elimination and put the pressure right back on Boateng.
The crowd clapping him on, Sénéchal-Becker sprinted forward and cleared. The risk paid off. It seemed a storybook ending… until Boateng responded by upping his own bar to 2.10 m, which he managed to clear on his first attempt.
“The guy has a lot of potential. He’s gonna be a problem for sure,” Sénéchal-Becker said of the 18-year-old son of Canadian 1999 Pan Am Games high jump champion Kwaku Boateng.
In response, Sénéchal-Becker re-raised to 2.12, which he, in turn, topped in just one try. Boateng, who had never before cleared 2.11, finally failed to match him. After finishing second on tiebreak at the Niagara 2022 Canada Games, this time, the gold belonged to Sénéchal-Becker.
“I’m a bit of a vet at this point in the sport,” smiled the Louis-Riel high school grad. “I think of myself as a clutch person. The adrenaline is so big for me and it came in clutch just when I needed it.”
 100vw, 780px”/>Ottawa’s Thomas Sénéchal-Becker won his first senior men’s high school title at the Canadian Track and Field Championships on Aug. 3 at Terry Fox Athletic Facility. Photo: Farrah Philpot</p>
<p>Even with all the gamesmanship and bar movements, the high jump was simultaneously something of a low-key affair. It’s just the nature of the sport, Sénéchal-Becker suggests, where athletes spend the majority of their time chatting on chairs as others take their turns.</p>
<p>“I’ve actually seen some people complaining about it (high jump) being too nice,” Sénéchal-Becker reflected in an interview with the Ottawa Sports Pages’ Keiran Gorsky.</p>
<p>Internally, though, that silver in Niagara has been eating at him. Behind the showy demeanour, there’s a relentlessly competitive part of Sénéchal-Becker, desperately trying to get back in form after an injury he sustained two years ago.</p>
<p>“I want us all to succeed, but there is that little side of me that really wants to beat them all,” he highlighted.</p>
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Will Batley (centre) won the men’s 200 m in Canada Games record time. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
At different points in Will Batley’s gold medal-winning 200 m dash, the wind intermittently ripped in his face and pushed him along from behind.
But at the most important moment, the wind was officially registered at a legal 1.6 m/s, and when the 18-year-old CANI Athletics sprinter crossed this finish line, he was not only crowned champion, but also the Canada Games’ best of all time.
Batley’s sparkling new personal-best time of 20.57 seconds broke Sam Effah’s 2009 effort of 20.65.
However bothersome the wind may have been, it all has a way of falling to the wayside in mad dashes for your life.
“The adrenaline starts to come, and you just don’t feel anymore,” Batley described after the race, still catching his breath.
Out in lane six, Batley strained to outpace the two competitors to the outside before the bend in the track. But his surge down the stretch allowed him to beat out Manitoba’s Jared Hiebert and New Brunswick’s Jackson Banks by .19 and .27.
Right away, he ran over to the fence to give his mom a hug.
Canada Games record-setter Will Batley shares some love with his fans. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
Sprinter finishes with 2 relay titles, 3 gold
Batley later showed he had some juice left in his legs as he ran the lead-off leg for the Ontario men’s 4×400 m relay team. Batley, who’d earlier won gold in the men’s 4×100 m relay, handed off to Zach Jeggo of the Lions en route to a third championship title in the final event on the track. Ontario won the race in 3:10.94.
Zach Jeggo. Photo: David Howells / Canada Games
It was the second medal of the meet for Jeggo, who’d earlier won silver in the men’s 400 m.
It’s been a difficult season for Batley, who began rounding back into form come the Canadian Championships in Ottawa a few weeks ago where he won U20 men’s national silver in the 200 m.
He worried the recurring hamstring injury that ended his senior high school season at West Carleton might threaten his trip to Newfoundland. He was a little startled to ultimately see his name on Athletics Ontario’s July roster announcement.
But the faith was clearly justified as he laid down the best performance of the under-24 Canada Games competition ever as part of his triple-gold medal meet.
Throwers leave with medals and pins aplenty
As the Canada Games draw to a close, athletes’ lanyards have become totally unwieldy. Dozens of little pins now decorate virtually every athlete, many of whom devote large parts of their remaining free time to trading tokens with volunteers.
Jessica Gyamfi pin collection. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
The Gee-Gees’ Jessica Gyamfi, who competed at the recent FISU University Games, where pins were a similarly hot commodity, might have ventured to Newfoundland with an ace up her sleeve if she so chose. The 21-year-old ultimately opted against it.
“As much as I wanted leverage pin trading, if I could start my way from the bottom at FISU, I can start my way from the bottom here,” joked the Ottawa Lions Track and Field Club athlete.
If that was the goal, she and fellow Lions club member Connor Fraser succeeded tremendously. On Saturday, they also walked away with marginally more valuable hunks of metal.
Competing in the men’s discus throw, Fraser, this year a provincial champion, was the exception to the rule as far as the unrelenting wind was concerned. Tailwinds, Fraser describes, carry those heavier and less elegant hunks of medal further than they would otherwise ever fly.
Millican Field in Oklahoma, for example, has become famous for its advantageous conditions, which Lithuania’s Mykolas Alekna exploited early this year to break the world record.
The cold was certainly less ideal, and four of Fraser’s six throws wound up as fouls. The only one that mattered, though, was his fifth, which flew 47.97 m to secure him the silver behind Alberta’s Weezy Eze.
Connor Fraser. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
Fraser wasn’t overly happy to have finished second, even as he thoroughly enjoyed his time in Newfoundland.
“I think it’s by far my favourite track and field experience I’ve ever had,” indicated the 21-year-old Immaculata High School grad.
His furthest throw was well short of his 51.55 m personal best he recorded earlier this year. On the plus side, someone did offer him $20 for his P.E.I potato pin.
Jessica Gyamfi. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
Though the gusts didn’t directly affect Gyamfi’s much heavier shot put, it was a great pain to heave herself face-first into the wind.
“It’s like, pray you can keep your form and push against the winds,” she described.
Gyamfi threw foul throws on two of her first three attempts before nudging herself into medal position towards the end. Her sixth and final throw, sailing 13.22 m, stood as her furthest. She wound up with the bronze medal, behind Quebec’s Efe Latham and New Brunswick’s Audree LeBlanc.
Ottawa pair advance to women’s baseball final
Sofia Milks. Photo: Christina Marshall / Canada Games
There are simply too many So(f)phias on the Ontario women’s baseball team. What happens when someone shouts out their name?
“All three of us turn around every single time,” the East Nepean Eagles’ Sophia Audet lamented.
Audet and her teammate Sofia Milks of the Ottawa West Twins are Ottawa’s two representatives in Canada Games baseball.
Sophia Audet. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
They both double as pitchers and outfielders and their birthdays are one day apart.
“We started using nicknames, though, so it’s helping,” Audet laughed.
The 16-year-old appeared late as a pinch hitter in Ontario’s 9-1 quarterfinal drubbing of Saskatchewan. The victors hit three home runs, all solo shots, as they advanced to the semi-finals to take on British Columbia.
B.C. bested Ontario 6-5 in the preliminary round, but it was a wildly different result in the semi-finals, where Ontario brushed aside their west coast adversaries 13-2. They will take on Alberta on Sunday morning for the gold medal.
Undefeated Alberta advanced to the final with a 5-2 win over Nova Scotia. It was the first time in the tournament Alberta didn’t win by the 10-run mercy rule, including a 15-5 trouncing of Ontario in the preliminary round.
National capital wrestlers add silver medals
Makinleigh Courtney. Photo: Keiran Gorsky
National Capital Wrestling Club’s Makinleigh Courtney nearly made good on her vow to get revenge on B.C.’s Kai Pare after falling to her in the team portion of the event, where the Ontario women took silver.
Courtney setup the rematch in the final of the women’s 59-kilogram individual event after dusting Saskatchewan’s Angelina Singh by technical superiority in the semi-finals.
The 16-year-old from Kingston fell behind 8-0 not even half way into the first period, but clawed her way back to 8-6 before ultimately falling 12-9 to the youth national champion.
In the men’s 65 kg final, National Capital’s Dexter Bates again faced B.C.’s Dominic Wendt whom he had beaten the day before in the team event. The OFSAA champion from Holy Trinity Catholic High School was up two points with eight seconds left, but Wendt threw him on his back in the last action of the match to prevail 14-12.
Women’s volleyball & soccer, men’s softball will all play for gold
Ontario’s women’s soccer team advanced to the gold medal match with a 5-4 win over Alberta on penalties after a scoreless draw. Danica Menard subbed off at the beginning of the second half while fellow Ottawa player Fiona Cortes-Browne did not feature. They will play Quebec on Sunday afternoon in the gold medal match.
Ontario’s men’s softball team also advanced to their gold medal game with a 9-2 win over Quebec. West Carleton Electric Softball’s Conner Hopper walked in his only at-bat. Quebec, which handed Ontario its only defeat in preliminary-round play, bested third-ranked Nova Scotia to secure a rubber match on Sunday morning.
Jasmine Chrétien (left) and Eva Génier. Photo: Montana Fuoco / Canada Games
Eva Génier and Jasmine Chrétien also helped Ontario’s women’s volleyball team to the gold medal game with a close-fought 25-21, 26-24, 24-26, 26-24 win over Saskatchewan in the semi-finals.
Deng Yout and Ontario’s men’s volleyball team were stunned in straight sets by Manitoba, 25-23, 25-19, 25-23. The women’s team will play Alberta for gold while the men’s team will meet Quebec for bronze.
In the men’s platform diving event, Rafael Serey-Cormier finished 17th.
Final Day Preview: More medals coming in baseball, soccer, volleyball, softball
At least seven more medals will fall into Ottawa athletes’ hands on the final day of the St. John’s 2025 Canada Summer Games, with several more solid podium prospects.
Guaranteed at least silver medals by reaching team sport finals are Sophia Audet and Sofia Milks in women’s baseball, Jasmine Chrétien and Eva Génier in women’s volleyball, Fiona Cortes-Browne and Danica Menard in women’s soccer, and Conner Hopper in men’s softball.
 100vw, 780px”/>Conner Hopper. Photo: @_connerhopper Instagram</p>
<p>Solo women’s bronze medallist Madison Murphy will go after medal #2 at the Games with the Ontario artistic swimming team for their acrobatic routine final. Ontario was ranked second behind Quebec after the preliminary competitions.</p>
<p>Also at the pool, Ella Lindsay will dive for Ontario’s ‘A’ team in the mixed team event and Rafael Serey-Cormier is on Ontario’s ‘B’ entry, while Deng Yout and the men’s volleyball team will play for bronze.</p>
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A huge team of 48 Ottawa athletes is competing at the St. John’s 2025 Canada Summer Games in Newfoundland. The Ottawa Sports Pages will be sending out a free daily email newsletter with recaps, previews and profiles throughout the Aug. 9-24 national youth multi-sport event.
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