Four Plant City kids win at Central Florida Regional Soccer Shoot
The Elks National Soccer Shoot competition is an annual contest where kids from around the country are able to showcase their talents through contests that test their skill levels, with five different age groups included for both boys and girls.
The Soccer Shoot consists of two different contests based on the age group of the participants. For those in the U-8 age group, the event features a “Five Goal Contest” that includes a series of five goals at which the participants aim, decreasing in size from 48 inches to 17 inches. For the four older age groups ranging from U-10 to U-16, the event features a “Grid Goal Contest” in which participants shoot at a full-size goal that is sectioned off, with different point totals awarded for different sections. In the Grid Goal Contest, participants rotate throughout three different rounds where they take five shots, resulting in 15 shots total, and the highest-scoring athlete advances.
Ben Edgemon has been a member of the Plant City Elks Lodge since 2009, organizing the local event since 2016 and seeing it grow to a level where Plant City has 144 individual athletes participate in this year’s preliminary round across all five age groups in both gender divisions.
Following the local and district rounds, Plant City’s remaining representatives took to the Central Florida regional level competition in Umatilla, Fla. where seven of the 10 age groups were won by local Plant City athletes, earning their spot in the state round, also to be held in Umatilla on Dec. 10. Once at the state round, six Plant City kids advanced to the southeastern regional round — once again held in Umatilla.
The southeastern regional round played host to 30 total kids from Florida, South Carolina and Georgia across all five age groups, with three finalists in each group. From that group, Plant City’s Trotter Richardson won the Boys U-16 group, Jiovanni Rosales won the Boys U-10 group, Julia Ocampo-Cruz won the Girls U-10 group and Thiago Pena won the Boys U-8 group. Additionally, Richardson and Ocampo-Cruz were the event’s highest overall scorers for the boys and girls divisions, respectively.
All winners at the state and regional level will now have their scores sent to the national level where national champions will be determined for each of the age and gender groups.
Plant City Main Street kicks off city-wide search for the Golden Train
The Golden Train will take you all over historic downtown and make its trip through some incredible places. If you are the lucky one to find it, treasure will be yours!
Visit https://www.plantcitymainstreet.org/goldentrain to see the list of participating businesses. These are the Golden Train’s scheduled stops. It could be ANY of these businesses! Your quest is to search inside these businesses and see if the train has stopped there. The Golden Train will not move from its location until it has been found and no purchase is necessary to participate.
Once the Golden Train has been located, the winner will be photographed at the found location with the Golden Train and their reward. Winners will be shared on our social media and highlighted on our website.
Once the Golden Train has been found, it will then move on to the next stop and the Golden Train will not return to the same stop until it has visited all of the other stops on the list. This is a continuous hunt so the fun and exploration will never end.
Stay tuned to the Plant City Main Street Facebook page and website at www.plantcitymainstreet.org for Golden Train updates and to keep up with their efforts throughout historic downtown Plant City!