Sam is soaring to great heights!
November 3, 2017
Tracy Shutler, proud mother and proud union worker has been employed at the County of Northumberland for more than 21 years.
Tracy has been a union steward at that location since it was organized almost 12 years ago.
From an early age Tracy’s son Sam displayed an above average athletic ability. In fact when Sam was in elementary school he won gold in every event he entered, but he always excelled at high jump. When he broke a 25 year high jump record at his school, his family knew he had a special talent.
A teacher at Sam’s secondary school saw the ability as well. He was jumping heights well above other boys his age and hit the 2 metre mark at age 15. With this, the teacher set up a meeting with a coach from the University of Toronto for Sam to showcase his skills.
After exceeding the qualifying height of 2.6 metres (he actually jumped 2.10 metres) Sam won a spot on the commonwealth youth games team where he took the silver medal with a jump of 2.09 metres.
Sam is currently attending his final year of high school in Toronto so he can train daily and is working towards competing in the World Youth Championships in 2018.
This athleticism runs in the family as well, in addition to high jump Sam runs alongside his younger brother Jared, who with two other young men are the Canadian National relay champions in the 4 x 100 metre relay. The same group of boys also competed in the indoor national championships and currently hold an indoor record for the 4 x 200 metre relay.
Congratulations Sam, and thank you Tracy for sharing your LOCAL STORY with us. Best of luck to Sam in the future!