Canadian Masters T&F Champs
Kamloops - July 17-19 2009

New: Race report by Frank Stebner. 

Ideal running conditions for today's Running Room Shaughnessy 8k road race attracted a field that was both faster and larger than last year. Victoria athletes were prominent, with Ryan McKenzie powering away from the pack to take first place with a time of 24:12, which demolished the previous course record by 38 seconds. David Jackson, also from Victoria took second place and Ryan Day of Vancouver was third.

In a closely contested women's race Rachel Ruus finished first from Anne-Marie Madden and Joan McGrath.

Other noteworthy performances came from Herb Phillips who broke his own M65-69 course record from last year and at the same time took first in the age-graded competition. Maurice Tarrant from Victoria also set a new course record in the M70+ category.

As well as the competitive athletes it was good to see the large number of youngsters and family groups out for some friendly competition in the 5k walk.

Thanks to all the runners, volunteers, officials and sponsors who helped make this a fine day of road racing. 

Full results can be viewed from the Shaughnessy race web page. Two photo albums are now available: start and finish-line and pre and post race (photographer Tu Anh Chau).

In recent weeks LGRR was well represented at two major US marathons. On April 20 four club members ran in the prestigious Boston marathon. Greg Welwood's time of 3:13 is excellent for the demanding Boston course. 

On May 3 in Oregon two Lions Gaters ran the Eugene marathon. Ian Druce finished in 6th place with the splendid time of 2:33:20.

Congratulations to you all. Full results can be viewed at Boston Marathon Results and Eugene Marathon results.

 Boston Marathon - April 20 2009

 Eugene Marathon - May 3 2009

What a day for a run around the beautiful Vancouver waterfront! Over the years the Vancouver marathon has suffered more than its share of cold, wet weather. Today it made amends with splendid fine and cool running conditions.

From my viewpoint at the end of Pipeline Road and I was pleased to see a number of Lions Gaters well placed in the half marathon field. In the marathon I only noticed Ray Barrett¹, who looked fresh at this point (just beyond halfway) and went on to record a creditable 3:15 Boston qualifying time.

¹Updates:

1. New club member David Poon also ran the full marathon, clocking in with a good 3:32.
2. Sara Bucovaz ran the marathon too, finishing under the Boston qualifying time for her agegroup. Congratulations to all three marathoners; I think they all set new PRs.

Here are the results for the members I noticed. I have most likely missed some so please let me know of any omissions. Full results are published at the Race Headquarters site. 

 Vancouver Marathon - May 3 2009

 Vancouver Half Marathon - May 3 2009

The Times Colonist 10k race took place in Victoria today. This year's race was capped at 13000 entrants and there were around 10000 finishers. I see two Lions Gate names in the results: Josh bettered his Sun run time by a few seconds and Mark Shorter strayed from his usual appointment with the Big Sur marathon this weekend to take 5th place in the M50-54 category.

Mark Shorter 164th overall, 5th M50-54, 39:04

Josh Tanner 199th overall, 34th M25-29, 39:37

Easy to miss among all the Sun Run hype, but there was also a 50k trail race last weekend. Chris Price ran the Diez Vista race in the Buntzen Lake - Eagle Ridge area and you can read his race report here in his blog. Congratulations to  Chris on finishing this demanding trail course in good shape (aside from a few blisters) in under six hours.

Update: I just realized (thanks to Carlos) that Rob Lang also ran Diez Vista and finished in 8th place with the superb time of 5:08:49. Rob was the winner of Diez Vista at least twice back in its early days in the 1990's.