OLDS — Local throwing athlete Rachel Andres is still pursuing her dream of competing in the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics.
Unfortunately that’s been made harder by a decision by Athletics Canada not to fund her. So she’s been raising money on her own and with the help of friends and acquaintances.
The latest endeavour in that campaign is the annual Christmas Mini Trade Fair & Cookie Walk, which takes place today, Friday, Nov. 22 at the Olds Cadet Hall from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Andres is hoping to raise at least $5,000 so she can attend major meets in Australia and New Zealand in mid-February. She hopes to compete in another meet or two later on as well.
As of last week, she’d raised about $2,800.
Andres is hopeful she’ll get more financial support as well.
“I have been nominated for a sponsorship through a local company,” she told the Albertan. “I have not been approved yet, but my nominator thinks I stand a good chance.”
Andres was asked if she could still go to that meet if she doesn’t meet her fundraising goal.
“Yes. I’m working on some of the plans for Australia right now,” she said. “And I’ve got some supplementary money I’ve been saving up for a few years just in case.”
Andres said the top 32 in the world qualify to go and she’s currently ranked No. 32. But she needs to compete in some major track meets in order to make sure she stays in that top 32, and hopefully climbs higher in the rankings.
Another way to qualify would be to meet or exceed the automatic standard, currently 63.50 metres. About 15 people in the world have thrown that far. Andres' personal best is currently 58.44 metres, but she is aiming to meet that standard. If not, the goal is to at least stay in the top 22.
“Canada has one high level meet the whole year and it is the Olympic trials. I need good meets in before the final cut-off,” she said.
In addition to the Feb. 13 Australia meet there are others -- in Cuba and again in Australia near the end of March.
It’s not cheap to fly to and from Australia. Or to Tokyo for the Olympics, so Andres plans to attend those meets by herself, leaving her husband and three-year-old son at home.
She said plane tickets to Australia alone are $1,200.
"My husband’s going to get left at home alone a lot this year,” she said with a small laugh.
“We’d looked at, like, taking them to Tokyo for the Olympics and it was not going to be feasible. It was going to be, like, $15,000 for them to go too. So they’ll stay home for that too.”
“I’ve been trying to prep my husband for this by a couple of Kamloops meets. So I’ve left him alone for a weekend to kind of see how they do,” Andres said.
She was asked how the family managed while she was gone.
“Ummm, not as well as I would have hoped. But he’ll have help,” she said, adding later that “there are several women from my church who have volunteered to watch my son when I need to be gone to offset childcare costs and allow my husband to keep his time off for another time. Gives me peace of mind to have people willing to help out.”
