www.sportmanitoba.ca

Sport Manitoba is proud to provide leadership for initiatives that increase and enhance opportunities for participation by women in sport. A major initiative is the Women to Watch Grant Program.

Working in partnership with Provincial Sport Organizations, Sport Manitoba provides a monthly grant of $500 to a female athlete, team, and official or volunteers to assist them in enhancing their women in sport career. A $500 monthly grant is also awarded to a female coach to assist them in further developing the skills necessary to attain a higher level of coaching or increased level of coaching experience.

Sport Manitoba is pleased to announce our Women to Watch Grant Recipients – April 2010 – August 2010

Athletes:

Shae Fournier – Water Polo

Shae is a 17-year-old water polo athlete who just won Gold at the Junior Pan American Water Polo Championship where she scored two goals in the final match to help Canada win over the USA 8-7.

She has played water polo for 6 years and this is her fourth year on the Canadian National team. She has won gold at the Junior Pan Am Games in 2008, and placed 5th at the Junior World Championship in 2009. Her awards include the All Star – Youth National Championships, Cora Campbell Award, three years in a row for recognition of excellent work ethic, leadership, and willingness to fill any role on the team and sportsmanship. She has also been MVP for four years in a row at high school provincials. She volunteered as a coach for Middle School Water Polo at Grant Park high school from 2007-2010.

Shae is presently attending Indiana University and playing for them in the NCAA league.

She is using her grant money for the cost of summer training and travel to the Junior Pan American championships.

Taryn Grant – Water Ski

Taryn is 15 years old and already has won a silver medal in jump at the Junior World Water Ski Championships in Italy this past summer. She also won gold in jump, slalom, and 1st overall in the junior category at Nationals. Her high scores qualified her for the open women’s event where she won silver in jump, bronze in slalom, and 2nd overall.

She has been named to Water Ski Wakeboard Canada’s Development Team and will be competing in the Can Am Challenge in St. Louis, MI this September and the Pan Am Championships in Santiago, Chili in November. In 2009 she was voted as the Water Ski Wakeboard Canada Junior Skier of the Year and Water Ski Wakeboard Manitoba Female Athlete of the Year.

Taryn will be using her grant money to pay for costs to travel to Italy prior to World’s to train and acclimatize herself prior to her competition.

Taylor Pischke – Volleyball

Taylor, 17, has been playing volleyball competitively for four years on her school, club, and beach/indoor provincial teams. She has represented Manitoba on its Provincial Indoor team for 4 years and Provincial Beach team for 3 years. Last summer she competed on the team who won Gold at the 2009 Canada Summer Games in PEI. They were selected as the Province’s Junior Team of the Year. As a 15 year old she won the National U16 Beach Championships and as a 14 year old made it to the national final losing a close match to Ontario in the U14 division.

Prior to competing in volleyball Taylor was a competitive Rhythmic Gymnast who won a silver medal at the Western Canadian Rhythmic Gymnastics Championships.

Her grant money will be used to offset costs for training and travel to out of province tournaments.

Kristine Grenier – Hockey

Kristine is a 17-year-old hockey player who was selected to attend the 2010 Hockey Canada Strength and Conditioning Camp in Calgary this past May. She also represented Team Manitoba in the U-18 Female Hockey Nationals in Surrey BC where they placed 4th. She played on Team Central at the 2010 Power Smart Manitoba Winter Games where they won Gold and she was the tournament points leader. Kristine was also part of team who won the 2010 Midget Female AA Hockey League Championship and once again she was the points leader and then competed in the West Region Championships (Female AAA/AA Midget) vs. Saskatchewan league champions.

Kristine comes from a town of approximately 100 people where she grew up playing hockey, travelling 22km to Notre Dame de Lourdes to play hockey. Her challenge has always been travel. It’s 65km to her training centre in Morden and 140km to Winnipeg for further opportunities. She is using her grant money to pay for travel costs and increased sessions with a trainer to help her reach her goal of playing at the next level, the national team.

Coaches awarded Women to Watch Coaching Grants:

Dallas Ludwick – Diving

Dallas is a fully certified level 4 diving coach who has coached at the Pan Am diving club for almost ten years and now is an independent coach and a national team coach. She has just had one of her athletes make the team to compete for Canada at the upcoming Commonwealth Games in India this October.

Dallas has many years of being involved in major games and gaining international experience. She will be using her grant to continue to be able to accompany her athletes as they strive to be on the National team.

Lyndsay Houston – Gymnastics – Trampoline, Tumbling and Artistic

Lyndsay has been coaching Gymnastics for 13 years and Trampoline for 5 years. She is certified as a national judge and was a provincial coach for the 2010 Western Canada Cup held in Airdrie, Alberta.

She will be using her grant to work with two national coaches on teaching more senior skills in Trampoline and Tumbling so that she can bring these skills back to her athletes in Manitoba. She is also working on her level 4 certification.

Caleigh Christie – Biathlon

Caleigh is working on her technical 3 biathlon certification and is travelling to Canmore, Alberta to finish it this fall. She is presently working with the Canada Winter Games biathlon-training group and will be attending the Games in Feb. as one of the coaches for Team Manitoba. She grew up in Falcon Lake and was part of the very strong biathlon community there. She has also been very successful in her academics as well as making a commitment to her coaching career.

Sport Manitoba is a not for profit organization and the lead planning, programming and funding agency for the development of amateur sport in Manitoba. Sport Manitoba partners with over 100 organizations to deliver sport in our province and is responsible for programs including the Power Smart Manitoba Games, Coaching Manitoba, Team Manitoba, Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame and Museum and KidSport.