Tristina Howse needed to sweat out one more kilogram to make her weight category.
Despite her best efforts, the scales were not co-operating. So rather than resort to drastic measures to make the cut to compete in the 80-kilogram category at the Canadian juvenile wrestling championships in Calgary, Howse was grouped in with the heavyweights.
It was a significant disadvantage, having to make a 10kg jump, but Howse took it in stride and came home with two medals - silver in Greco-Roman and bronze in freestyle.
"I was .9 (of a kilogram) off my weight but I was too dehydrated to continue cutting, so my coach (Cris Monetta) said not to," said Howse, a Grade 11 student at Prince George secondary school.
"It was a good experience but I wish I'd made weight. Going up a weight class was very difficult for me."
Howse competed Monday in the freestyle event. She started with a 4-0 win over Helen Antoniak of Edmonton, then lost 12-2 to Santina Luti of Regina and 10-4 to gold medalist Kaylee Cyr of Nanaimo.
On Tuesday, she and Cyr met again in the Greco-Roman final, which Cyr won 10-3.
"(Cyr) won provincials for the 110kg weight category and they were all really tall - over six foot - and I'm five-foot-three," said Howse. "It was pretty hard, and Greco is really hard because you can't touch the legs."
Howse captured the provincial silver medal in the 80kg class in early February to qualify for nationals. She won a silver medal a year ago at the national event in New Brunswick.
Now heading into her final year of high school, Howse plans to continue wrestling. She hopes that will lead to a university scholarship, preferably at the University of Calgary, where this year's nationals were held.
"I'm going to be training hard in my Grade 12 year to place as high as I can," said Howse, an aspiring nurse. "I met a couple people who wrestle (at the U of C) and it's a good school. They have nursing there."
In other local results, Haley Florell of Mackenzie claimed a silver medal in the cadet girls 80kg event. Florell won her first two matches - defeating Jannah Levi-Ward of Kent County, N.B., 6-4 and Samantha Paradis of Saskatoon, 8-4 - then lost in the final 5-0 to Serena Woldring of Edmonton. The match ended when Florell suffered an injury.
