It didn’t take long for Oyinko Akinola to redeem himself at the provincial high school track and field championships last weekend.

Shortly after the Grade 12 Dakota Collegiate student was involved in a botched baton exchange that saw his team disqualified from the 4 X 100-metre relay, he was looking to make amends in the long jump.

The St. Vital resident launched himself 6.36 metres to win the gold medal, his first at the provincial meet.

"I was feeling bad about dropping the baton," he said. "It felt pretty good to get a (personal best) in the long jump after that."

Akinola added a silver medal in the high jump, which he says is his best event. The problem is, that’s also the best event for River East Collegiate’s Alhaji Mansaray, whose two-metre jump was 10 centimetres higher than Akinola’s best.

"He makes me better," Akinola said of his rival. "I jump my best against him."

Mansaray added gold medals in the 100-metres and the triple jump to his collection.

He was happy with the hardware, but disappointed in his time of 11.28 in the 100-metre final.

"I look at it more as poor conditions than anything," said Mansaray, an East Kildonan resident who was born in Sierra Leone.

The meet, which was held in Selkirk for the first time after years at the University of Manitoba, dealt with extreme heat on Thursday and then periods of rain and high winds on Friday and Saturday.

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The St. Mary’s Academy junior varsity girls 4 X 400-metre relay team finished in second, but they still ended up with championship T-shirts. That was due to the generosity of the double gold medal-winning varsity crew, which won both the 4 X 400 and the medley and gave one set of shirts to the younger team.

"It’s the third year in a row to win both of them for three of us," said Julia Krovats, a Grade 12 student from River Heights who ran one of the 200-metre legs of the medley. "We’re all equally strong and we know how each other runs. It feels really amazing."

Grade 11 student Rebecca Sass joined veteran champions Krovats, Annie Quinton and Erin Teschuk on the team.

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There were some standout performances for Vincent Massey Collegiate, including star middle-distance runner Julia Zrinyi setting a new meet record in the varsity girls 800-metres and winning the 1,500, making her undefeated in the two events over her high school career.

Levi Sader won the varsity boys 400-metres and finished second to Elmwood’s Tyree Cayer in the 200.

Grade 10 student Mikaela Van Schepdael was elated with her gold-medal run in the JV girls 400-metres, a personal best of 1:00.49.

"I was thinking I wanted a PB for sure," she said. "It feels excellent. I didn’t want to be too overconfident, but I was happy with my training."

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The overall meet champion for AAAA schools was Sisler, which also won the JV boys category.

Kelvin was tops in JV girls, while Vincent Massey was the varsity boys champion and Oak Park won the varsity girls title.

avi.saper@canstarnews.com