Indigenous WA students test themselves in Alaska’s Traditional Games

In a circle, student athletes squat down and place their hands between their legs near their feet. Locking their elbows, they slowly tip forward to shift their weight from their toes to over their hands. A few yelp. 

The Alaska Native and Native American youth were practicing the one-hand reach, a difficult move requiring athletes to balance their weight on one hand while reaching up with their free hand to touch a suspended ball. 

It’s part of their training for the Annual Traditional Games in Juneau, Alaska, this weekend. The regional competition serves as a qualifying event for the Native Youth Olympics, a major athletic contest hundreds of Alaska Natives participate in each year.

Generations of Alaska Natives have played these games, meant to hone survival skills — strength, endurance, flexibility and more — needed to hunt, fish and carry heavy loads across long icy distances. Today, young Alaska Natives honor the abilities of their ancestors through the annual competition, which began in 1971.

“Part of these games is about learning to deal with pain, because when you’re on a hunt in the Arctic sometimes your bones are so cold it hurts,” said Native Youth Olympics Seattle Coordinator Heather Puri, a Tsimshian tribal member.

Some are physical tests, like the Inuit stick pull, which was used to practice pulling heavy seals out of the water. Others also challenge an athlete’s mental fortitude or agility.

Kenneth Beedle, head coach for the Seattle team, said the traditional games don’t have the “toxicity” of Western sports competitions, and are more focused on achieving personal bests. It’s not uncommon for direct competitors to root for each other in events, he said. 

Life in the harsh Alaskan climate depended on a willingness to share knowledge and support one another, he said.  

“It comes from hundreds and thousands of years ago, teaching your tribes and tribe members how to survive and be alive and live a good life and feed your family,” said Beedle, whose wife and four children are Tsimshian tribal members.

In parts of Alaska, Indigenous games have been popular for decades. Now, a growing number of Alaska Native families in the Pacific Northwest see them as an important way to embrace their culture and community.

This year will be the first time a full Seattle team — 13 student athletes — will participate in the traditional games, Puri said. Since January, she and a group of Native families have practiced weekly at local gyms and fitness studios to prepare.

Weekly practices up until the Annual Traditional Games were financially supported by the Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska, the state’s largest federally recognized tribe. Nearly 23% of Tlingit & Haida tribal citizens under the age of 18 live in Washington, about 1,600 children. The Seattle team was recently awarded a city grant to continue practices twice a month through the end of the year. 

Puri first began organizing day camps and training sessions in 2023 in an effort to build up activities for Alaska Native families in the Seattle region. Growing up near Los Angeles, she at times felt disconnected from her tribal community. “The only other Natives I knew were my brothers and sisters,” she said. She didn’t want that to be the case for her own children.

Puri sees traditional sports as not only a chance for Native kids to hang out with one another, but also a valuable way to allow young people of all backgrounds to interact with vibrant Alaska Native cultures beyond museum displays and school textbooks. 

“It’s really alive, it’s a living thing,” she said. 

For Annette Warbus, an enrolled member of Tlingit and Haida Tribes who grew up in Metlakatla, Alaska, and now lives in Bellingham, seeing her son Russell participate in the traditional games has been a delight.

Watching as Russell practiced his one-foot high kick, a move traditionally used as a signal for a successful hunt across long distances, Warbus said her son’s school district doesn’t offer access to sports related to his Native heritage the way some in Alaska do. 

The long drive down to Seattle for weekend training has been worth it, she said. 

“We don’t get the opportunity to be a part of a lot of Alaska Native events,” she said. “When this came up and it actually fit our schedule, we jumped on it.” 

Jasmine Knudson, another enrolled member of the Tlingit and Haida Tribes who lives in Kirkland, was similarly excited at the opportunity to blend her Indigenous culture with her passion for athletics. 

An avid golfer who was born and raised in the Seattle area, the Bellevue College student said she was always jealous of the kids who participated in cultural events and competitions in Alaska.

One of the events she’ll compete in this year is the “seal hop,” in which athletes get into a push-up position and then hop — seal-like — forward across the floor on their hands and toes. It’s a test of endurance, she said, a way of practicing sneaking up on unsuspecting seals by mimicking how they move on ice.

This will be her first time participating in traditional games, but she said she’s not nervous. 

“It’s very welcoming, even with the competition,” Knudson said during a recent practice session at North Seattle College. “Everyone is cheering people on, even if it’s your first time.” 

She hopes to eventually serve as a coach for future Alaska Native athletes in Seattle, “the next generation,” she said.