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Two titles better than one

Rob Vanstone
Leader-Post 3/22/03

The McNab twins -- Tyler and Tamara -- were born one minute apart.

On Wednesday night, their city-championship victories were separated by a mere 20 minutes.

Shortly after Tamara won the female 52-kilogram title at the Regina High Schools Athletic Association wrestling championships, Tyler captured the male 70kg crown.

"It's pretty exciting,'' Tyler, 16, said following his match at the O'Neill High School gymnasium. "We're twins and we're both winning.''

"It's pretty cool,'' Tamara added. "We all knew Tyler was going to win, but I was a little nervous.''

Tamara's apprehension stemmed from the fact that her first match at the two-day event was against a formidable opponent, Lisa Morin of O'Neill, who ended up finishing third.

Tamara defeated Morin in overtime and overcame everyone else en route to a second consecutive city title. Tyler is also a repeat RHSAA champion.

The McNabs are in Grade 11 at Thom Collegiate.

Their older brother, Chris, is also a former city champion.

"My brother was the first to start wrestling,'' recalled Tyler, a member of the North West Wrestling Club.

"I joined up and then Tamara started later. She was getting bored of coming to watch practice, so she joined up, too.''

That was six years ago.

"The first year, I was the only girl in the club,'' Tamara said. "I had to practise against the boys. They made me so mad, because they pushed me so hard, but it helped me.''

Tamara defeated Rita Singharath of Usher in Wednesday's female 52kg final. Tyler proceeded to defeat O'Neill's David Weisgerber in a gold-medal match.

"Our parents (Lionel and Gail) want our school to come first,'' said Tamara -- who, like Tyler, is an A student.

"Our parents have been great to us. They've exposed us to a lot of tournaments. They used to take us to the States to wrestle and they got us involved.

"I'm glad they didn't. If they hadn't done that, I probably wouldn't be wrestling today.''

The McNabs are preparing for the Saskatchewan High Schools Athletic Association championships, which are slated for March 28-29 at Johnson Collegiate.

The following weekend, they are to compete at the Canadian juvenile/cadet championships in Calgary.

Tamara is the defending national cadet champion at 52kg. Tyler was third in the country at 68kg last year. He finished second in 2001. This year, the McNabs move up from cadet to juvenile. The latter class is primarily for Grade 11 and 12 students.

"We're pretty close,'' Tamara said. "We talk all the time and we hang out. Usually, twins don't like each other at all. That's not the case with us. We get along really well.

"At school, our averages are so close, so we always compete to see who has the higher average and who's the smarter kid.''

Tyler helped Thom win the fourth city male title in school history. Johnson had won the previous four city team titles.

Johnson was also dethroned as the female city champion after winning six years in a row. The host team from O'Neill ended Johnson's streak last night.

Results are in Local ScoreBoard.