On Friday, May 31st, 10 athletes representing the Special Olympics Stokes County bowling program headed to Raleigh to compete in the 2024 Summer Games. They joined nearly 1500 other Special Olympics athletes and unified partners from across the state for a weekend of competition and fun.
This year marks the fourth Summer Games that have been attended by our athletes and was the largest number of athletes so far. This year, we had five bowlers compete in the Singles event, two teams competing in the doubles event and, for the first time, one team competing in the Unified Doubles event.
The athletes that competed in the singles event were Jackson Chapman, Eli Otten, Khloe Oxendine, Ricky Rickert and Sage Willard.
The athletes that competed in the doubles event were Morgan Wright and teammate Tristan Bramblett and Madison Cain and teammate Marshall Britt.
In the Unified Doubles event, athlete Braxton Eichel was partnered with his stepfather, Travis Franklin.
Each athlete that completed attended the Special Olympics Stokes County bowling sessions on Sunday afternoons at Rural Hall Lanes. Any athlete that is interested in attending the Summer Games is eligible as long as they have the required number of games bowled during practice sessions to be submitted to Special Olympics North Carolina in order to place the bowlers in their divisions for the state level competition. These divisions are determined based on age, gender and ability levels. Bowlers bowl on both Saturday and Sunday. Scores bowled on Saturday determine their final divisions for Sunday’s competition and the total of both Saturday’s and Sunday’s scores determine medal placements for each division.