Nine-year-old resident Tristan Arseneault is hoping to head off to nationals on July 1 to arm wrestle himself a medal.
The only issue facing the family is the expense of the trip. Tristan would like his entire family to come for the trip to Nova Scotia, which is expected to cost around $5,500, possibly more.
“Tristan’s heart’s desire is that [we all] be there,” says his mother, Ashley Arseneault. “We’re trying to support that.”
She says Tristan is a stickler about the goals he sets and rarely lets things get in the way of achieving them. “He’s very passionate and dedicated,” she says.
At the age of three, Tristan started in wrestling, where his natural athletic talent shone. When he participated in tournaments, he came home with gold medals. Since then, he’s gone on to secure gold at a recent powerlifting event where he deadlifted 150 lbs.
“That’s almost three times his weight,” says his dad, Nick Arseneault.
Nick says Tristan has been in arm wrestling for a year. His training started after one coach, Frazier Benoit, heard that Tristan had challenged the 13-year-old national silver medalist to an arm wrestle and won.
Benoit is a world champion arm wrestler who owns Frazier’s Next Level Coaching in Blackfalds, and Nick says he was really interested in training Tristan.
“[Benoit] was training that silver medalist,” says Nick. “When he heard what Tristan had done, he bugged us for about half a year to come train with him.”
Nick says Benoit’s training got Tristan to provincials. “He pretty much walked through provincials,” says Nick.
Should Tristan do well in the nationals, he could qualify to head to Kazakhstan for the World Championships at the end of August.
Ashley says they have created a GiveSendGo site (www.givesendgo.com/TristanANationals), and she is planning to take Arseneault out to ask businesses for donations. There will be a yard sale and potentially a bottle drive to help out as well. Ashley says she’s also banking on word of mouth, especially because of the short timeline they have.
Anyone looking to donate to help the Arseneaults can call Ashley at 780-514-5241, or Nick 780-898-3457, and emails can be sent to ashleyjeanarseneault@gmail.com.
