Today was to be the final day of the OFSAA Track and Field Championships and in that vein we see culminate our countdown of the Club’s all-time OFSAA performers with our number one seed, Sultana Frizell of Perth District Collegiate Institute. All told, Frizell racked up 12 medals during her OFSAA career, three OFSAA records and twice broke the Interscholastic Record in the shot put.
To help put her dominance in perspective, in grade 9 Frizell had her “worst” performance at OFSAA where she took midget gold in the shot put, bronze in the discus and was 13th in the javelin.
Due to her late birthday, October 24th, Frizell returned a year later and cleaned house in the throws. The Windsor Star put it quite succinctly when they wrote, “the meet wasn’t 19 minutes old when a 19-year-old held by Windsor’s own Joanne Rothery fell. Sultana Frizell, of Perth District, blew away Rothery’s mark of 12.25 metres.” Frizell broke it on her opening throw and on three successive attempts, pushing the mark out to a mind boggling 13.61 metres and a month than 2.5 metre margin of victory.
While she set no records in the discus or javelin that year, her dominance in each of those events on her way to gold were no less impressive. At 38.12 metres, Frizell’s discus throw was nearly four metres ahead of silver and a massive eight beyond bronze. The story was similar in javelin where a throw of 38.80 metres gave her exactly a four metre margin of victory.
Grade 11 brought about another OFSAA record for Frizell as she did away with Liz Polyak’s 20 year old mark of 13.48 metres when she dropped the four kilogram ball at 13.93 metres. Again, Frizell’s margin of victory was near 2.5 metres. In the discus, she was out duelled by Daisy VanRavenswaay and settled for silver. It would be her last OFSAA medal that wasn’t golden in colour.
Grade 12 brought about her third straight OFSAA record in the shot put, but this time she upped her game a smidge and took down Marisa Venier’s 18 year old Interscholastic Record of 14.26 metres at the same time as doing away with her own junior record. Frizell’s winning heave of 14.35 metres was again two metres clear of the competition.
Much like in grade 10, Frizell swept all the throws; however, this time it was in a unique manner. Frizell gold medal throw in the discus was more than seven metre further than the next best competitor, but her javelin only flew a mere 31 centimetres further. The unique point was that in both cases, Frizell’s implement landed at exactly 43.29 metres. Reflecting on the moment, Frizell believes she probably should have bought a lottery ticket after the competition.
By the time she reached grade 13, Frizell had begun shifting her focus from the shot put towards training for the hammer throw, which is not contested in Ontario high schools. Despite the shift, she still managed to extend her Interscholastic Record to 14.61 metres. The mark came during the East Regional competition at Terry Fox with a driving rainstorm blowing down.
A week later, Frizell’s best effort of 14.04 metres in the shot put gave her a fifth consecutive gold in the event, but unfortunately was 22 centimetres shot of a complete sweep of the OFSAA records.
Frizell added another gold in the discus, this time taking the victory over Van Ravenswaay, which brought her five year OFSAA total to an amazing 10 golds.
Following her high school career, Frizell accepted a scholarship to attend the University of Georgia where she would earn multiple All-American distinctions in the hammer throw and begin her long international career in the event.
Qualifying for her first Olympics at the age of 23, Frizell would represent the maple leaf in both Beijing and London. She would twice win Commonwealth gold, setting multiple Games records which still stand today. As well, Frizell would pick up Pan Am silver and bronze and would go on to set the North American record in the hammer throw twice. The latter mark of 75.73 metres still stands as the Canadian record, more than three metres further than any other Canadian. The mark also ranks her 27th globally in the history of the event.
Following her final hammer throw competition, where she took bronze at the 2018 Canadian Championships, Frizell entered school to become a registered massage therapist, receiving her certification this past January from the RMT Association of Ontario.
We hope you’ve enjoyed this countdown as much as we have. While it was tough not enjoying another OFSAA Championship, we certainly welcomed this walk down memory lane.
Next for us is to put together a list of the Club’s all-time performers for both men and women, so please stay tuned for that.