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in si de ha lto n. co m O ak vi lle B ea ve r | T hu rs da y, Ja nu ar y 3, 20 19 | 20 In March of 2019, three young Butterflies will spread their wings beyond Oakville and fly to Abu Dhabi for the experience of a lifetime. The trio, members of the Oakville Butterflies rhyth- mic gymnastics club, will represent Canada at the Special Olympics World Games, being staged March 14-21 in the capital city of the United Arab Emirates. As a result of their ex- ceptional showings at the Special Olympics Canada 2018 Summer Games, held this past summer in Anti- gonish, N.S., Julia Kostecki, 21, Annick Leger, 22, and Sa- rah Lisi, 31, were chosen for Canada's six-member rhythmic gymnastics team; five of the athletes are fromfive of the athletes are fromf Ontario and one is from Al- berta. Kostecki, a member of the Oakville Butterflies for five years, picked up fivefive years, picked up fivef gold medals at nationals (in ribbon, rope, ball, group routine and all around) and one silver (in hoop) to earn her the top score among Level 1 athletes, while Le- ger, who has been involved in the sport for nine years, took top honours in Level 2 with four gold medals (hoop, club, rope and all around) and one silver (rib- bon). At Level 4, Lisi is a veter- an of the sport, which she has pursued for 18 years. She is a three-time nation- als participant and at the 2018 Summer Games, won two gold medals (group, rib- bon) and three silver med- als (ball, rope, club). Just over three months from now, they will join ap-from now, they will join ap-f proximately 7,000 Special Olympics athletes from 170 nations competing in 22 sports in the Middle East- ern desert city. "It's a phenomenal op- portunity and a great expe- rience even just meeting other families from around the world. We're flying to Dubai to spend some time there experiencing the cul- ture. I'm curious to see what the girls will take back with them," said Yolanda Kos- tecki, Julia's mom and vol- unteer coach of the Oak- ville Butterflies for the past three years. Since nationals, the ath- letes have been individually assessed through Special Olympics and given specific fine-tuning tips. With thefine-tuning tips. With thef exception of a group train- ing session in October and another upcoming in Janu- ary, coaching is left to the individual parents. The ex- pectation is that athletes will train several times a week in addition to the two- hour sessions the club holds Monday nights at St. John Paul II Catholic Ele- mentary School. They might need to focus on smil- ing more during their rou- tine, perhaps add more gracefulness to their per- formance or work on coreformance or work on coref strengthening. Special Olympics Cana- da has created an online program the athletes need to complete on a daily basis logging their diet and the amount of exercise, all of which goes to the Canadian head coach so she can mon- itor their training regimen. The Oakville Butterflies 3 OAKVILLE BUTTERFLIES OFF TO SPECIAL OLYMPICS WORLD GAMES The three Oakville Butterflies who will compete in the Special Olympics World Games in Abu Dhabi next March as part of Team Canada, left to right, Julia Kostecki, 21, Annick Leger, 22, and Sarah Lisi, 31. Graham Paine/Metroland KATHY YANCHUS kyanchus@metroland.com NEWS See COACHES, page 28