Five members of the Cook County Community YMCA North Shore Rollers competed in the Harold Fischer Memorial log rolling tournament held in Hudson, Wisconsin on Saturday, April 11 and everyone rolled really well. (L-R) Ali Duclos, Wellesley Howard-Larsen, Taylor Everson, Paige Everson and Dominick Wilson.
Five members of the Cook County Community YMCA log rolling team participated in the Harold Fischer Memorial Tournament held in Hudson, Wisconsin on Saturday, April 11, and three came away with medals.
Allesandra “Ali” Duclos took second in the U-10 girls’ division while Dominick Wilson placed third in the boys’ U-13 bracket and Wellesley Howard-Larsen placed third in the U-17 age group.
While Paige Everson didn’t take home any hardware, she gave Livi Pappadopoulis a great match in the girls’ U-13 division. Everson took the unbeaten champion to the 4-log in one of the most exciting matches of the day. Livi hasn’t lost a match in over two years, rarely even taking a fall in a tournament.
Ali Duclos placed second in the U-10 division. To get to the medal round Ali and teammate Taylor Everson had to roll against each other. The teammates were tied at two falls each before Taylor fell to end the match. Both girls rolled great throughout the tournament, a testament to their training this winter. Nothing’s tougher than seeing two friends roll against each other, but the two finished their match with a big hug.
Wilson started off the tournament with slow feet. He lost two matches and then, down 2-1 in a match to a roller who has beaten him repeatedly throughout the last year, Dominick dialed down his form, came back and blew his competitor off the log two straight times and then went on to win two more matches before losing a close contest to the overall champion. A long time coach told Dominick he had never seen a log roller transform from being mediocre to great in one tournament the way Dominick did. Maybe next time Dominick will do a longer warm-up, or focus the way he can earlier in a tournament instead of waiting until the chips are down.
In the U-17 Wellesley Howard-Larsen lost a close match to Alicia Diethert then fell to Caitlin Potts who took first in the division. The three have rolled against each too many times to count throughout the years, swapping wins and places against each other while remaining the best of friends.
After the tournament was over a drawing was held to see who would win a free log for their program. Only people who have volunteered to help at tournaments during the 2014 year qualified, and when the winning slip was pulled a surprised Tony Everson went up to get the certificate he will use to order a log. The log will be donated by 7-time log rolling world champ Jamie Fisher of Hayward, Wisconsin. Fisher builds and sells logs when he isn’t out across the country with his lumberjack sports shows, and to help grow the sport he continues to give a $500 log away each year to a lucky program.
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