Keep your eyes focused on yet another Alexis Creek athlete in the national rugby spotlight.
Alexis Creek’s Emma Feldinger will shed her Falcon feathers to become a UBC Thunderbird next fall, as the Grade 12 Lake City secondary student has committed to play rugby for the school.
The Falcons standout, who has spent time with both the BC provincial and Canadian rugby teams, said she’s looking forward to helping the team succeed next year.
“It’s really exciting,” Feldinger said of the opportunity.
“Both my brothers went to TRU in Kamloops, but I wanted to be different and go somewhere else. My dad went to UBC so I was interested, the opportunity arose, so I thought, might as well.”
Feldinger is no stranger to the rugby training facility at the University of British Columbia. She’s been a highly-touted member of the BC provincial team and has been training there since she was in Grade 9.
“The UBC head coach, Maria Gallo, I’ve known her since she coached me at the U16 level,” Feldinger said. “She’s very energetic and intense, and very passionate about rugby, which is really nice.”
Off the pitch, Feldinger will be studying kinesiology.
“I’m looking forward to it: new experiences in life, meeting new people and being able to play rugby all year round,” she said. “That’s something we can’t do here, and was part of my decision to play there.”
Feldinger and her Thunderbirds teammates will begin training together at the end of August, and will enter into the team’s 15-a-side season in September stretching through the middle of November.
They’ll have a short Christmas break, before training resumes again for the seven-a-side season from January until March.
This week, Feldinger is travelling to Buranby with B.C.’s under-18 team to compete at the seven-a-side nationals.
“If we make it into the final there we get to play at BC Place this Saturday afternoon,” she said. “We’ve won it the past two years for under-18, so we’re hoping to go for three years in a row.”
Feldinger was a member’s of last year’s gold-medal-winning squad, and said the rest of the country will be gunning for them.
“We’ve got about half last year’s roster on this team, so a nice mix of old and new players making the transition,” she said. “This group is pretty close. We’ve been playing together since U16.”
In between her studies, Feldinger will have a busy training regiment at UBC.
The team works out in the gym Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings, and practices Tuesday and Thursday evenings.
Games, meanwhile, take place on Saturdays in the Canada West division.
Here in Williams Lake, Feldinger is also preparing for the Falcons’ upcoming rugby season, where they’ll play host to the girls 15-a-side provincials at the end of May.
“I’m just really looking forward to it — a new stage in life.”
Feldinger joins Alexis Creek’s Jake Ilnicki and his older brother, Riley, who have competed on the national level for Canada.