Running: Canadian Cross Country Championships

Monday, December 06, 2004 - 04:56 PM

Report from the Master's Race.

Hey everyone,

Cross-country is over for this year. The Canadian National X-C championships were this weekend, here in Toronto at Sunnybrook Park. I elected to take part in the Masters' 8K race as I did in a series of events leading to this final one.

I wasn't so lucky with the weather conditions this time, but, really, it IS December. Race day was cool and cloudy. The thermometer still said it was above 0 C so of course it was still shorts weather :-) As we drove to the park, Sabrina, April and I admired the large and pretty waves crashing over the breakwalls along Lake Ontario. Wind was definitely going to be a factor today.

Once we checked in with our club organizer and got our numbers, it was time to go warm up and scout out the course. April wasn't running this one due to the fact that she just had surgery to remove her gall bladder last week, so Sabrina and I joined Dave D for the customary warm up loop. Although I had run 2 previous x-c events in the park, this route was different and looked a bit confusing on the map. Finding the start and finish lines were easy enough and off we went. We jogged the entire course loop which ended up being about 3K, so we figured we had to do that one 2x but where were we going to make up the last 2 K? We were confused. Off we went to find someone to explain the route to us. Okay, got that straightened out, 1 mini loop, 2 big loops and a final mini loop to the finish line. Easy enough.

The start line announcer was kind enough to give the runners a warning that it was time to take off the warm-up clothes before the actual start to the race. Nice! We lined up and were off. The Masters race was a mixed field, so there were lots of bodies out there. The wide starting line quickly narrowed as we headed out. The first little loop (about 1K) was crowded & madness the whole way. Lots of legs and arms (and spikes!) were jostling for room. I fought for position and some wind protection that I knew I was going to want later on. I briefly noted that May Allison (whom I beat at provincials 2 weeks ago) was ahead of me and thought I would just stay a bit behind her. But she took off shortly after I had that thought and I never saw her again. I wasn't feeling really comfortable for the first mini loop but settled down a bit as we headed down and around the perimeter of the big soccer fields. Finally! The field started to thin out.

It was WINDY, and I tried to catch a small group of guys ahead of me to draft behind. As I headed up the small hill back up to the starting area, I heard April cheering for me. More cheers from friends as I made my way around the upper section of the big loop. It was nice how my friends spread themselves out like that :-)

I got passed by one girl here and decided to try not to lose sight of her and maybe catch her at the far end of the soccer fields. I started to feel stronger during the second loop. Caught and passed the few guys I was trailing as I spied 2 girls ahead of me. The one who passed me earlier and another girl. I slowly made up the distance between me and the first girl. She heard me coming and said some encouraging words as I passed. I appealed to her to come with me but she appeared to be struggling, so I edged ahead on my own. Now the question was, could I catch the girl who passed me earlier on? I tried to put it into another gear but it wasn't really there. I was determined to finish strong in any case. I made up some distance on the other girl but she was putting on a finishing kick too. I could hear friends cheering for me as I finished the last little loop and headed around the curve into the finish area. A quick glance to the clock let me know that I only had seconds to get under 32min, so I put on one last desperate surge across the finish line. Final watch time 32:01 - darn, missed it by that much. Thankfully getting through the chute was a lot quicker today than at provincials 2 weeks ago. April was there at the end with my warm-up clothes which I quickly donned and headed off for a cool down. Thank god she had some water because the race directors hadn't provided any for the athletes for some reason!

Later on at the Masters' award ceremony, I found out that I placed 3rd in my AG. How cool is that?! A look at the results later on in the day told me that my final official time was 32:02 and I was the 9th woman overall. Not bad for a National Championship race. Might have to do this again next year, but they are in BC, so then again, maybe not.

A fun day, all around. April and I stuck around to watch the Senior Women and Senior Men race. Two pretty good races to watch. Some excellent running to see.


Melanie Boultbee
Toronto, Ontario