Logan Mend left the Canada Summer Games in Winnipeg with a bronze medal in beach volleyball.
He did so while representing Team Ontario with Tomas Sorra of Toronto. Mend, a Naramata native who graduated from Pen High, wasn’t even planning on playing in the Canada Summer Games until Sorra was informed he couldn’t play indoor for Ontario.
“It was pretty amazing,” said Mend, of winning bronze, in two sets against Alberta. “I got a lot of backlash from my buddies on the west coast for being a traitor, but it was awesome.”
Mend played for Ontario primarily because of logistics as he has trained all summer in Toronto with Sorra as they prepared for the FIVB under-21 World Championships in Nanjing, China last month. Mend also said it would not have been fair for him to join Team B.C. so late and play with someone he was unfamiliar with.
“It was a good tournament and I think our initial goal was to win gold,” said Mend. “The semifinal (against Nova Scotia) I didn’t have my best performance. We came back and turned it around in the bronze. It was a good finish. It was awesome to help Ontario get a medal.”
Mend and Sorra went 5-0 before meeting Nova Scotia. They never faced B.C., which disappointed Mend. It didn’t feel strange for Mend to represent Ontario, as he is entering his fourth year with the York University Lions and lives in Ontario eight to 10 months of the year.
The biggest lesson Mend learned playing in the Canada Summer Games was about mindset.
“I had a preconceived notion of winning the tournament going into it,” he said. “That’s not the right mindset to have.”
In other action, KISU’s Tyler Wall helped B.C.’s men’s 4x200 metre relay team capture gold in seven minutes, 48.82 seconds, in what was described as an exciting race. Wall, pulled ahead of Ontario in the final 50-m.
“I wasn’t thinking, I was just going for it,” said Wall of swimming the anchor leg. “It’s awesome. One medal’s fine for me, but I am going for more.”
In baseball, Daniel Martin and B.C. finished fifth in the final standings. B.C. closed out the Games with a 7-3 win over Quebec. B.C. was 3-3 in round robin.
“I don’t think not one of us had our best week of baseball. It was a big letdown,” said Martin, who plays for the Langley Blaze. “I think that every one of us knows that we could have won that tournament no problem.”
Martin said he had a strong tournament defensively, but could have had more luck at the plate.
After the first week of competition, B.C. is second in the medal standings with 65, including 29 gold.