Nunavut teen celebrates medal haul from World Dwarf Games

Zoe Elverum, 14, prepares to throw a javelin during the track and field event at the World Dwarf Games, hosted in Guelph, Ont. in August. (PHOTO COURTESY OF Z. ELVERUM)

Elverum holds up a gold medal, one of two she earned at the World Dwarf Games in Ontario last summer. (PHOTO COURTESY OF Z. ELVERUM)

Neighbours of the Elverum family might have noticed 14-year-old Zoe running up and down the driveway to her Pond Inlet home with a harpoon raised above her head.

The Nunavut teen isn’t hunting, though; Zoe Elverum is training for track and field. The harpoon is the closest thing she can find to a javelin.

“There’s no SportCheck here or field to go outside to run down,” she said. “Sometime kids look at me and say, ‘What are you doing?’”

But Elverum’s efforts paid off big time this past summer when she returned home from an international sports competition with a collection of gold and silver medals.

Elverum took part in her first-ever World Dwarf Games, held in Guelph, Ont., Aug. 4 to Aug. 12. The international competition gathers hundreds of dwarf athletes, or little people who are athletes, from around the world, tailoring sporting events to their shorter stature.

The Pond Inlet athlete competed in a whopping 11 events, returning home with a gold medal in both floor hockey and soccer and silver medals for volleyball and her specialty—javelin.

Elverum had previously competed at an event in the United States called the Athletic Association of U.S. Games, although it was a much smaller event where athletes competed individually, rather than for their home country.

“It was my first time representing Canada,” she said. “You feel like the whole country is cheering you on.”

Of all the events Elverum competed in, floor hockey was the most exciting—and racked up some of the biggest wins. Team Canada won its first game against Team USA 12-0, its second game against the UK 16-0, and the final match against Team USA again 20-0.

“We weren’t even sweating,” she laughed.

Elverum has lived her entire life in Pond Inlet. She was born prematurely—the first non-Inuk born in the High Arctic community since the 1940s, she’s been told.

Local elders named her Oopik, or snowy owl in Inuktitut, because Elverum was “small, white and had to fly,” she explained, describing the medevac right after she was born.

Dwarfism is a genetic condition that usually results in an adult height of about four feet, 10 inches or shorter. It’s not necessarily considered a disability, although people of short stature can suffer medical complications related to the condition.

Medals aside, Elverum discovered a camaraderie and level of competition at the World Dwarf Games that she hadn’t experienced before.

As she and her mom Shelley pulled up to their hotel in Guelph ahead of the events, the first thing Elverum saw was a group of little people sitting on the front steps of the hotel.

“It was kinda neat,” she said. “Just to be part of a team where everyone’s at the same level.

“It’s hard here because I’m the only little person at my school,” said Elverum, a student at Nasivvik high school. “So I don’t have any other little people to compete against.”

When she plays basketball at school, Elverum said she gets the “little sister vibe” where students back off and let her shoot unchallenged.

Elverum knows of a couple other Nunavummiut living with dwarfism, but they are not a large enough group to have established a network in the territory.

The World Dwarf Games were such a nice change, she said, “like when the volleyball net is actually at your height.”

But she has no plans to stop playing sports in her home community or at school.

And next, Elverum has her sights set on competing in the 2024 Paralympic Games, so she has plenty of time to perfect her harpoon throw.

Pond Inlet athlete Zoe Elverum, back row and second from left, poses with her Canadian soccer team at the 2017 World Dwarf Games. (PHOTO COURTESY OF Z. ELVERUM)