The Arctic Sports Championships wrapped up on Friday. The Champs took place April 6-8 at Vanier Catholic Secondary School in Whitehorse.

Grades 8-9 and 10-12 took their turn competing on Friday.

Several local schools, as well as a few from Juneau, Alaska participated.

Vanier’s Dimas Mateo Sotil, 15, finished the event in style, winning the Grade 8-9 Male One Foot High Kick and Inuit Stick Pull, as well as the Overall Grade 8-9 title.

Sotil, a native of Barcelona, Spain, won the High Kick by reaching a height of 265 cm, or about 8.69’. He even attempted to reach 270 cm, but wasn’t able to. He said it felt “really great” to win the High Kick.

“I think I beat my personal best. My personal best was 8’5”. I think I just passed it.”

Sotil explained what made him successful.

“I just keep trying until I get it ... I never focus on missing it. I just focus on ‘I have to kick it’ and I just kick it. “

After winning the stick pull and overall title, a very sore Sotil expressed how he felt.

“I feel pretty proud I guess. I did a good job. I wasn’t expecting to do this good, but I’m pretty happy.”

Sotil had a real battle on his hands in the stick pull.

“The stick pull is very very tough. I thought I was going to lose, but I just pulled through it.

“It was tough. My hands hurt a lot from the stick pull. My arms, my back, everything hurts a lot,” stated Sotil.

Sotil was pleased to win first overall as well.

“It does feel pretty good.

“I’m happy. I did pretty good today,” added Sotil.

Eric Porter, Arctic sports instructor for Yukon Aboriginal Sports Circle, said it was a good day.

“It’s always fun when you get the high school students in, because it’s the most competitive aspects of each event. So you get to see a lot of the top athletes in Whitehorse compete against each other.

“And having Juneau come as well is actually huge, and just to grow Arctic Sports in the Yukon is very important for us.”

Porter estimated 50-60 kids took part in Friday’s events.

“It was good. It gets less and less hectic after each day, because you start with the younger kids first. It’s just about growing Arctic Sports – that’s the most important. And a lot of them have fun.”

The team from Juneau was comprised of Juneau Douglas High School, Thunder Mountain high School, and Dzantik’i Heeni Middle School. A total of 10 kids competed.

Juneau coach Kyle Worl was happy with the way the event went for his young group.

“I think this is a super-great event. This is our third time attending. We weren’t able to attend for a couple years because of the pandemic but we’re glad to be back and we brought a lot of our younger athletes so they gain experience and meet new athletes and experience Whitehorse.

“It’s been a fun trip so far. We got to do some exploring to Carcross yesterday but this is what they’ve been waiting for. To be on the floor and meeting other athletes. So it was a good day and I’m proud of them. I think they did really well.”

They brought a couple of middle-schoolers along, too.

“I think it was great ... a lot of the younger ones set personal records for themselves. This was the first time we traveled with some of our middle-schoolers, so it’s a really good experience event for them. They’re still kind of learning the rules and how the games work in a competition setting, so this was a really good introduction for the younger ones.”

Worl added “thanks to the Yukon Aboriginal Sports Circle for hosting us and inviting us. We’re always really appreciative of coming here and it’s always a great event.”