December 16, 2008
Nick Walker and Adam Lawrence
Nick and Adam were the top Harriers at the Dave Smart Beer Mile today. Nick was first overall in a time of 6:18.0 and Adam was 6th overall in 7:31.0. Nick chose Granville Island Winter Ale, from a bottle and Adam chose Okanagan Springs, from a can. There were 37 finishers on an icy, snowy track in Oak Bay.

December 13, 2008
Sara Pape-Salmon, Louise Proulx and Gerry Etcheverry
Gerry (Course Lead Bunny) re-flagged many portions of the Stewart Mountain 10-Mile Cross Country Challenge course today prior to top runners reaching the peak of Stewart Mountain. Sara and Louise (Course Sweep Bunnies) came in at 2:54:19 and 2:54:20 ensuring that the last finisher crossed the line prior to the tear-down. Harriers' Jason Terauchi-Loutitt set a new course record in 1:02:21 by winning the race and breaking Stefan Jakobsen's previous mark, set in 2004, by almost 2 minutes. Harriers Eric Findlay, 1:04:07, Shane Ruljancich, 1:06:53, Kirk McNally, 1:08:05, were second, third and fourth overall. Kevin Searle had a brilliant race, finishing as top master and fifth overall in 1:08:08 making it a clean sweep for the top five PIHers. The top female Harrier, Melanie McQuaid, was second woman in 1:18:42. The overall female winner was Nicole Akeroyd in 1:18:30. The race saw a record 187 finishers. A special thank you goes to Randy Duncan and Moe "The Eagle" Beaulieu who, not only ran the 10-mile race and placed well in their age class, but ran the course again to take down the flagging after the final runner had crossed the finish line. They ran for more than 3.5 hours covering over 20 miles on Saturday!

December 7, 2008
Jon Brown
Jon finished in 2:12:26 to beat the Canadian A+ standard of 2:12:38 at the 62nd annual Fukuoka Marathon in Japan. He was ninth overall out of 439 finishers and qualified as part of Team Canada to compete in the World Marathon Championships at Berlin in September, 2009. Harrier David Jackson ran 2:27:28; he was 59th overall. In a very unique format, all contestants are required to reach each 5K checkpoint in under 18 minutes in order to continue. If you don't make it, you are pulled from the course. This marathon is one of the most competitive events in the world with elite invitations being sent to top marathoners from United States, Canada, Europe, Mexico, Kenya, Ethiopia, Great Britain, New Zealand and Australia. Ethiopian Tsegaye Kebede won the race in 2:06:10. All of the top Japanese marathoners were invited to compete, but only those who could run sub-2:50 were allowed to finish. Of the 580 starters, 141 were yanked from the course for not making the time standard at each of the checkpoints. Former Harrier, Stefan Fairweather, running for New Zealand, finished 360th in 2:43:51.

December 6, 2008
Nick Best, Shane Ruljancich, Joan McGrath and Lara Wear
Nick finished second overall, in 35:16, after leading for more than 9 kilometres, at the 25th annual Vancouver Gunner Shaw 10K XC race hosted by LGRR at Jericho Beach. First male, Patrick Goeres, was only 7 seconds ahead of Nick finishing in 35:09. Shane was fifth overall, in 36:12, and second Harrier, less than a minute behind Nick. Conditions were ideal at today's race with sloppy, shoe sucking mud and some great puddles and slippery climbs. Twenty-three Harriers made the trip over to Jericho. The top female Harriers were Joan McGrath, 39:38, and Lara Wear, 46:06. Prairie Inn Harriers won two of three PIH/LGRR Interclub Challenge team trophies and claimed the overall club championship for 2008. PIH claimed the women's division and master men’s division and LGRR took the senior men's division. Next year PIH hosts the Inter-Club Challenge at the Thetis Lake course, celebrating our 25th annual Victoria Gunner Shaw Cross Country Classic.

November 30, 2008
Nick Best, Katherine Brown and Dianne Dennis
Nick Best was 6th overall today at the Seattle Half Marathon in 1:17:04. Harriers Katherine Brown and Dianne Dennis ran 1:46:28 and 1:46:29 respectively. There were 7,247 finishers in the Seattle Half Marathon - 3,037 males and 4,210 females.

November 30, 2008
Gary Duncan and Claire Morgan
Running the Merrython 8K one day after running the Gunner Shaw 10K, Gary and Claire were the top male and female Harriers at in the Oak Bay Firefighters Merrython 8K Fun Run. Funds raised go to help CFAX Santas Anonymous.

November 29, 2008
Scott Simpson and Lucy Smith
Scott and Lucy were the top male and female finishers at the 24th Annual Gunner Shaw Cross Country race held in memory of the late Gunner Shaw. Scott finished in 35:31 and Lucy finished in 41:36; both established new course records. Harriers took second and third overall with Paddy McCluskey, 36:45, and Jason Terauchi-Loutitt, 36:49. The second female was Melanie McQuaid in 45:09 and Jessalyn O'Connell finished third in 45:34. The race saw 426 finishers making it the largest 10K cross country event in Canada. Proceeds from the race ($10,000) will be donated to the Heart and Stroke Foundation of B.C. and the Yukon in honour of Harrier Dave Reed who passed away 6 days ago as a result of a stroke and a staph infection.

November 23, 2008
Wendy Davies, Gary Duncan, Bob Reid and Garfield Saunders
Gary, Bob and Garfield were part of the top Prairie Inn Harriers Male 50+ team at the 43rd annual Bazett Farm Cross Country Race, the oldest continuous cross country race in British Columbia. Gary was second in the Veteran Men's Division. Garfield was second and Bob was third in the Super Veteran Men's Division. All ran 5.2 kilometres in ideal cross country conditions on the muddy, slippery, hilly course. Wendy topped the Veteran Women's Division and finished second female overall to race winner Kari McIntyre from Bastion Running Club. She ran the same course in 1972 as a 14-year old and perhaps holds the record as "longest span between Bazett Farm races" with her 36-year absence before returning in 2008 and running the 5.2K course 10 minutes faster than in 1972.

November 15, 2008
Ryan Day and Sonja Yli-Kahila
Vancouver's Ryan Day won the race in 34:38 and Sonja was second F20 and fifth female overall, in 49:20, at the Bear Mountain Resort 10K Challenge today. Second place went to Rob Mandje, of North Carolina, in 34:52, while Harriers' Jason Terauchi-Loutitt took third in 35:01. The top female was Samantha Dubinsky in 46:44. Harriers' Colleen Butler was third female and top master in 48:42. The third annual race saw a record field of 305 finishers.

November 11, 2008
Wendy Davies, Karen Lawless, Joanne Rosen and Dee Ogden
Wendy Davies, Karen Lawless, Joanne Rosen and Dee Ogden were part of the first place Master Women's team, PIH - Viva La Diva, at the 12th annual Thetis Lake 20K Relay today in 1:35:35. Team Captain, Wendy Davies, quipped that second place Super Veteran Men's Team, PIH - Team 257, comprised of Bob Reid, David Hoskins, Garfield Saunders and Bill Scriven earned bragging rights for only one year and that she'd bring a Veteran women's team to rise to the challenge in 2009. PIH 257 was the combined age of all four super vet runners and they beat the 20-year younger Viva La Divas masters team by 2 minutes and 18 seconds thanks to Dr. A. smoking BBK on lap 2 while running his first relay with a stainless steel hip. A record number of 165 teams (650 runners) finished. For the first time in the history of the event, the Thetis Relay sold out four days before the race and NO day-of-race registrations were taken. The online registration system shut down on November 7 at noon due to the race reaching its capacity and nearly 40 teams were disappointed by not being able to enter due to their tardiness. PIH contributed 36 teams and 140 runners to the event, also a race record. An additional 30 Harriers volunteered bringing the club total to 170 members involved.

November 11, 2008
Norm Tinkham and Nancy Tinari
Norm and Nancy were the top Harriers and top male and female overall of the 70 finishers at the Remembrance Day Master's 8K Cross Country race held at 11:01 am at Stanley Park. Norm's winning time was 25:51 and Nancy's was 28:53, good for sixth position overall. Kevin O'Connor placed second in 27:10 while Larry Nightingale, from Halfmoon Bay, took third in 28:05. Second female was 34-year old Rachel Ruus in 30:03 and Jeannie Bezdan placed third in 30:41.

November 1, 2008
Michael Lax, John Catterall, Garth Campbell and Gary Duncan
Michael, John, Garth and Gary represented the only PIH team attending the inaugural Westwood Lake 22K Relay in Nanaimo today and narrowly missed winning the championship title by a mere 15 seconds. Their team of Once Fast - Now Dead Last was anything but dead last as they ripped around the 5.5K circuit of Westwood Lake in 1:24:05 to place first in the Master Men's Division and second overall to the Senior Men's winner, Westwood Running Club, who finished in 1:23:50. Third place went to Running Room - Team #1 and the Junior Men's winner, Team Chronic, took fourth overall in 1:29:43. Shawnigan Stags placed fifth in 1:32:49 and won the Junior Mixed division. The top Senior Women's team was Four Foxy Finishers, in 1:43:58, and the top Senior Mixed team was Smashed Pumpkins in 1:42:00. Twisted Soul Sisters won the Master Women's Division in 1:53:12, Bassett Folkes won the Family Division in 1:35:45 and Jarhead Donald Peterson won the Solo Division in 1:47:28. The PIH Once Fast - Now Dead Last team all ran within 50 seconds of each another on their lap of about 21 minutes per runner. There were 50 teams in the Westwood Lake Relay hosted by Bastion Running Club. Gary showed great character by running the first lap for the Harriers team, then changing shoes and completing another 3 laps to unofficially finish 10 minutes ahead of Jarhead, the 22K Solo winner.

October 26, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt, Nick Best, Phil Nicholls and Cheryl Murphy
Jason, Nick and Phil finished 1-2-3 at the 33rd annual Shawnigan Lake Half Marathon today in 1:12:57, 1:16:39 and 1:17:30. Each of them won their age category and Phil was top master. Cheryl was top female, 7th overall of the 155 finishers, with a new women's course record of 1:19:12. She broke Lisa Hill's mark of 1:19:33 set in 1990. Gary Duncan won the M50 division and Angela Plamondon won the F40 division one day after helping the PIH master's teams take gold and silver at the BC Cross Country Championships in Vancouver. Jason also anchored the senior men's team to a silver medal at the BCXCs on Saturday before winning the Shawnigan Half title on Sunday.

October 26, 2008
Dave Jackson, Scott Simpson, Colin Dignum and Herb Phillips
Dave, Scott and Colin finished 1-2-3 at the James Cunningham Seawall 5.9 Mile race which boasted a record number of 1,010 finishers. Dave broke the tape in 29:29 to win the race and top the M30 division. Scott finished in 30:16 and was running his third consecutive Sunday race finishing 2nd at RV 8K in Victoria, 1st Team BC member at the National 10K RR Championships in Ottawa and 2nd at the James Cunningham Seawall in Vancouver. Besides finishing third overall, Colin was top master in 31:20. Suzanne Evans won the women's division, 14th overall in 34:33, one day after winning the F35 division of the BC Cross Country Championships at Brockton Oval. Herb Phillips also did the double by winning the M65 division at the both the BCXCs and the JC Seawall. He was 18th master at Brockton on Saturday in 33:24 and 36th overall of 1,010 on Sunday in 36:53.

October 25, 2008
Jon Brown, Norm Tinkham and Garfield Saunders
Jon Brown and Marilyn Arsenault won the senior men’s and senior women’s races at the BC Cross Country Championships at Stanley Park today hosted by Hersey Harriers and Vancouver Thunderbirds. Jon won the 10K men’s event in 31:06 with Victorians Ryan McKenzie and Geoff Martinson taking second and third in 31:35 and 32:20. Three-time RVM champion, Steve Osaduik finished fourth in 32:25. Marilyn led from wire to wire in the 6K women’s race taking the crown in 22:24. Vancouver athletes Ashley Hinther, 22:28, and Laura Maludzinski, 22:36, placed second and third. Norm Tinkham was the master men’s 8K winner in 27:34 while three-time RVM Champion, Suzanne Evans, took the master women’s 6K title in 22:56. Harriers teams took silver medals in the senior men's and master women's divisions and captured gold in the master men's division. Garfield Saunders won silver on his 70th birthday in the M70 category, Hicham Elamiri took the M35 silver, Walter Cantwell won silver in the M40 division while Norm Tinkham claimed gold in the M45 category, Herb Phillips topped the M65 division and Brian Connon won the M60 division. Collectively, they were all part of the first place master's team at the BCXCs. Age-graded results will bring them prize money and nominations to Team BC. Cindy Rhodes took gold and Wendy Davies won bronze in the F50 division while Joan McGrath collected silver in the F45 division. The top two age-graded women were Nancy Tinari and Joan McGrath while the top two age-graded men were Herb Phillips and Norm Tinkham. There were 23 Harriers and 539 runners in 13 different age division races at the BC Cross Country Championships. The race was a qualifier for selecting Team BC to compete in the National Cross Country Championships in Guelph, ON, on November 29. It is expected that eight PIH athletes will be named to Team BC in the senior and master divisions.

October 19, 2008
Gary Duncan
Gary did a double race and recorded double master victories today at the 7th annual Goldstream Salmon 5K Run in the morning at Goldstream Park and the Peninsula Cross Country 5.3K race at Centennial Park in the afternoon. Nick Walker won the Goldstream Salmon Run in 17:14 and Gary placed third overall in 17:59. Bill Boothman won the Peninsula 5-lap 6.6K race in 26:00 and Gary was the first to finish the 4-lap master's M50 course in 19:52.

October 18, 2008
Scott Simpson
Scott was the top Team BC member and 15th overall in 31:13 at the National 10K Road Racing Championships in Ottawa today. Other Team BC runners were Jay MacDonald, from Vancouver, 17th in 31:16, and Lions Gater, Ian Druce, 32nd in 33:36. There were 190 finishers in the Canadian RR 10K Championship. The race was won by Simon Bairu, of Regina, in 29:13 and the top female was Toronto's Megan Brown, 35th in 33:53. The first Team BC female was Rachel Ruus, 53rd in 36:44.

October 18, 2008
Java Wear
Java was awarded the Harriers Top Dog plaque at the first annual Harriers Hounds 30 Metre Sand Sprint at Thetis Lake Park today. She darted from start to finish in 4.24 seconds. Second place went to Leela Arensen in 4.64 and third was Whamo Chapman in 4.65. There were 11 Harriers hounds competing for fastest dog bragging rights. Rueben Rosen, Molly Reid and Bindi Scriven placed 4th, 5th and 6th in 4.69, 4.74 and 4.78 seconds. Thirty spectators were in attendance including eight Hellions celebrating Sandy Auburn's birthday. A very entertaining new PIH event. The club is goin' to the dogs!

October 12, 2008
Steve Osaduik, Todd Howard and Jason Terauchi-Loutitt
Steve made it three in a row, Todd recorded his best RVM time so far and Jason gutted out a bronze medal performance after leading through the half way point as Harriers swept the top three positions at the 29th annual Royal Victoria Marathon under perfect, sunny, but cool conditions. Steve's winning time was 2:25:31, Todd's was 2:28:42 and Jason finished in 2:31:12. Edmonton's PIHer, Jonathan Withey, currently being coached by Jon Brown, had a breakthrough race by recording a 7-minute personal best of 2:34:59 to finish fifth overall. Gary Duncan also had a huge P.R. of 3:00:42 and Ken Bonner completed his 29th consecutive RVM to capture the silver medal in the M65 division. There were 2,507 registrations and 2,043 finishers in the 2008 Royal Victoria Marathon.

October 12, 2008
Ryan Day, Jim Finlayson and Norm Tinkham
New member, Ryan Day, and long-term member Jim Finlayson, two weeks after his 2:22 Toronto Waterfront Marathon, finished first and second in 1:08:50 and 1:09:11 at the Royal Victoria Half Marathon today. Norm Tinkham, from Maple Ridge, shattered the M45 course record by over 5 minutes to claim fourth overall of the 4,268 finishers with a brilliant 1:10:47 clocking. The top female was Lindsay McLaren, from Calgary, in 1:21:38. Other Harriers who had stellar Half Marathon runs were Nick Walker, fifth overall in 1:11, and Nick Best 9th overall in 1:14. Jack Miller and David Hoskins finished 1-2 in the M60 division in 1:26 and 1:28. There was a record number of 4,906 registrations and a record number of 4,268 finishers in the RV Half.

October 12, 2008
Farisha Arensen and Cyrena Timmins
Our 11-year old, young female Harriers, Farisha and Cyrena, finished 1-2 in the F12 division of the Royal Victoria 8K Road Race today in 36:36 and 38:24. Both of them were more than three minutes ahead of the F12 bronze medalist. The 8K race winner was new-Victorian Ryan McKenzie in 23:56 and the top female was Rachel Ruus, from Vancouver, in 28:39. Harriers Scott Simpson and Simon Whitfield finished second and third overall in 24:22 and 24:30. Gord Christie and Garth Campbell were 1-2 in the M45 division, John Cliff topped the M65 category and Nancy Tinari, 49, was top master in 28:44. There were a record number of 2,175 registrations and a record number of 1,894 finishers in the RV 8K this year. The 8K race was introduced in 1986 and the inaugural event was won by Harriers Gary Barber in 24:20. Gary currently holds the course record of 23:23 set in 1989. Harriers Ulla Marquette holds the women's record of 26:24 set in 1991.

October 12, 2008
Cheryl Murphy, Joan McGrath and Nancy Baxendale
Cheryl was first female finisher in 2:43:00 and Joan and Nancy were the top two masters at RVM today in 2:56:32 and 3:01:56. Cheryl narrowly missed the female course record by 28 seconds which had a $5,000.00 bonus attached to it. She won $1,500.00 for topping the women's division and will be back next year when she will be 40 years old and eligible to win the overall title for 3 grand, the master's title for 1 grand and the course record, currently 2:42:32 held by Edmontonian, Val Chowaniec, for 5 grand. Collectively this is a nice incentive package of $9,000,00 by lowering a RVM course record that has stood for 20 years. Harriers teams excelled at all three distances with PIH winning the Open Division in the Marathon and placing second in the Master's Division. In the Half Marathon, PIH was second in the Open Division and first in the Master's Division. In the 8K Road Race, Harriers teams made it a clean sweep by winning the Junior, Open and Master's Divisions.

October 5, 2008
Jon Brown and Dave Jackson
Jon placed eleventh overall today and Dave was 26th at the BUPA Great North Run in Newcastle, England. The half marathon, started by Tony Blair, boasts the highest number of competitors in the world with a starting field of more than 52,000. Jon's time was 1:03:36 recording a first 10K split of 29:59 and running his second 10K in 30:28. Jon's time is the fastest half marathon run by a Canadian so far this year. It is both a BC and Canadian M35 record. All 10 runners ahead of him were a mixture of Kenyans, Ethiopians, Americans, Irish, Spaniards, Portuguese or Mexicans. Dave ran a new personal best by 22 seconds and finished in 1:06:39. Tsegaye Kebede, of Ethiopia, led all the way to win the men's race and Gete Wami earned the title in a closer women's race. Kebede, who won the Olympic bronze medal in the marathon at the Beijing Games, won the annual road race in 59 minutes, 45 seconds. He was the only runner to complete the 13.1-mile race in less than an hour. Gebre Gebremariam, of Ethiopia, finished second in 1:01:29, and American runner Abdi Abdirahman was third in 1:01:33. Wami, a two-time Berlin Marathon champion, held off Magdalene Mukunzi of Kenya by a second to complete an Ethiopian double. Great Britain's Jo Pavey took third. Their times were 1:08:51, 1:08:52 and 1:08:53. It just doesn't get any closer than that for gold, silver and bronze in a world-class half marathon race!

September 27, 2008
Todd Nowack, Garth Campbell and Shane Ruljancich
Todd was part of the winning 2-man team with Squamish's Gary Robbins and Garth and Shane took the silver in the third and final Mind Over Mountain Adventure Race of the 3-race series including venues in Squamish, Shawnigan Lake and Cumberland. The Cumberland MOMAR included the sports of kayaking, orienteering, mountain biking (2 stages), trekking and urban navigation. Todd's and Gary's winning time was 4:01:25 and Garth and Shane hit the line in 4:30:45. The top solo male was Jeremy Grasby, from Cumberland, in 4:29:18 and the top solo female was Courtenay's Sarah Seads in 5:23:58. Harriers Sonja Yli-Kahila and Joelle McCartie placed 7th in the 2-women team division in 7:32:47 and Cara Obee teamed up with Vancouver's Kristy Storey to take 5th in 6:48:04. Brent Chan ran on a 4-person mixed corporate team called "Three Men and a Babe" and placed 4th in 6:00:52. There were 119 teams and individuals to finish the Cumberland adventure race.

September 21, 2008
Angela Plamondon and Roger Plamondon
Angela was top female, third overall, and Roger was awarded top runner even though he was not the first person to reach the finish line. In a bizarre episode of "course marshalling gone badly wrong", not one of the 50 contestants ran the proper 12.4 kilometre course of the Great Sooke Foot Race today. When Roger approached a key intersection of the route, the marshal sent him down the wrong road. The second runner was sent the same way and Angela, running third, followed. The fourth runner yelled at the marshal, "Hey, that's the wrong way!" to which the marshal made a "correction". Unfortunately, her correction was also a wrong way shortcut to the finish line whereby the remaining 47 runners all ran less than 10 kikometres while Roger, Angela and the second place male ran 17 kilometres. Race Director, Lisa Greig, showed good sense to hold back three draw prizes for the fastest three runners doing the "long" course! Race times were irrelevant so there were no results at press time.

September 14, 2008
Rui Batista
Rui absolutely crushed the field of 89 finishers today in the second annual Subaru Sooke International Sprint Triathlon with a staggering average cycling speed of 39.9 kph. This was the fastest bike portion of all 161 competitors in the Half Ironman and Sprint distances. Rui was 40th out of the water in 10:27 and passed 36 cyclists over 27 kilometres to finish the bike portion in 40:34. His 5K run of 20:31 moved him to the bronze medal position with a final time of 1:15:18 good for third overall. The winner of the Sprint Division was Nathan Killam, of Surrey, in 1:09:19 while Chris Bourdreaux, from Baton Rouge, LA, won the Half Ironman Division in 4:17:18. Coquitlam's Charlene Parrott topped the women's field in the Sprint in 1:21:20 and Haley Cooper, from Spokane, won the women's Half Iron in 4:36:17. Harriers' Bertrand Bozek, 9th in the Sprint, and Mike Janes, 13th in the Half, also did very well at Sooke. There were 72 finishers in the Half and 89 in the Sprint. The next week Rui also placed third overall, first master, at the Juan de Fuca Duathlon with a time of 1:13:14. The JdF Du was won by Hamish Nicolson in 1:08:54 and the top female was Anne-Marie Madden, 8th overall of the 76 finishers, in 1:16:30. Gary Duncan had a great race finishing 7th and top M50 in 1:14:20.

September 14, 2008
Nick Best, Cheryl Murphy and Phil Nicholls
Nick placed second overall, in 1:16:08, Phil was fourth and top master, in 1:17:34, and Cheryl took fifth and was top female with a new course record of 1:17:34 at the 13th annual Lands End Half Marathon hosted by the Peninsula Plodders. Cheryl's time lowered Ida Mitten's previous record of 1:19:58, set in 1997, by 2 minutes, 24 seconds. There were 189 finishers in the Half Marathon and another 90 in the accompanying 10K. Ian Druce, of Vancouver's Lions Gate Road Runners, won the race in 1:13:06 and pocketed $150 in prize money as did Cheryl for winning the women's division. Nick Best and Nancy Baxendale collected $100 each for second place.

September 14, 2008
Dave Jackson and Scott Simpson
Dave and Scott finished 1-2 at the Lands End 10K today with sparkling times of 30:36 and 30:47 on a very hot day in North Saanich. Kelly Guest placed third in 33:03 while Harriers masters Paul O'Callaghan, 34:43, and Gord Christie, 35:06, took fourth and fifth of the 90 finishers. The top female was Patricia Roney in 38:03. Both Jackson's and Roney's times were sizable course records by over 2 minutes each.

September 13, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt and Colin Dignum
Jason won the 5 Peaks Half Marathon at Bunzen Lake today with a time of 1:55:09 for an amazing margin of victory of almost 16 minutes! Second place went to Vancouver's Mark Bennett, in 2:10:54, and the top female was Colette Tunstead, third overall, in 2:23:19. Colin won the shorter 5 Peaks Enduro mountain race in 1:19:28. Chris Downie took second in 1:24:02 and the top female was Mirabelle Tinio in 1:36:36. There were 53 finishers in the Half, 154 in the Enduro and 215 in the Sport race for a total of 422 finishers.

September 11, 2008
Garfield Saunders and Sandy Anderson
Garfield collected four gold medals at the BC Seniors Games in Prince George held on September 11, 12 and 13, attracting thousands of athletes 55 and older. He was the oldest competitor in the M65 division, just 6 weeks shy of his 70th birthday. Garfield won the 5,000 metre race on Thursday in 22:13 and the 1,500 metre race on Friday in 6:01. On Saturday, he captured two victories by winning the 10K road race in 47:11 and taking the 800 metre track race in 3:05. He is in excellent shape to capture the M70 gold medal at Stanley Park in Vancouver on October 25, his birthday, at the BC Cross Country Championships. Sandy needed a wheelbarrow to take her awards home, a staggering total of 13 medals including 12 golds! Competing in the W65 division, Sandy won the High Jump, Long Jump, Discus, Shot Put, Hammer Throw, Pentathlon, Weight Throw and topped the Pentathlon in all five events including Shot Put, Discus, Hammer Throw, Javelin Throw and Weight Throw. Her only silver came at the Pole Vault. What an extraordinary performance for Sandy.

September 7, 2008
Steve Osaduik
Steve proved that he is over his knee injury and training is going extremely well for an attempt at the Royal Victoria Marathon 2:16:49 course record on October 12 in an attempt to become a three-time winner. Today, he simply blasted the field of 367 finishers with a 5 minute, 45 second, margin of victory over Paul Crosby, 42:07 to 47:52, at the Coho Festival 14K race in Vancouver. The top female was Shelly Grisbrook in 54:18. She was top master and 12th overall.

September 7, 2008
Nark Nelson and Shawn Nelson
Mark and Shawn placed first and second of 129 finishers at the Metchosin Days 5K in the Western Communities today. Their times were 16:28 and 16:46. It was Mark's 11th consecutive win at this race. Harriers Lowell Rockcliffe, 20, and Gary Duncan, 50, finished third and fourth in 17:56 and 18:09. The top female was Katie Nelson in 22:11.

September 7, 2008
Dave Jackson, Gord Christie and Cheryl Murphy
Dave won the Harbour City 10K in Nanaimo today in 31:56. Gord was third overall, top master, in 35:51, and Cheryl was fourth overall, top female, in 36:02. Dave and Cheryl won $250 each. There were 236 finishers in the 10K and an additional 157 in the accompanying Harbour City Half Marathon, won by Mark Cryderman in 1:13:28. The husband and wife Harriers team of Roger and Angela Plamondon did very well with Roger finishing eighth overall, fourth master, in 125:28 and Angela was fourth female, first master, in 1:33:10. Kristina Rody, of Whistler, won the women's division with a time of 1:25:13.

August 31, 2008
Nanci Tinari
Nancy was the top female and finished 11th overall of the 110 finishers at the Labour Day 8K in Vancouver today, the 14th and final race of the Timex Provincial Series. Her time was 28:24. The race winner was Oliver Utting in 25:00. Nancy, 49, clinched the women's Timex Series title by participating in 10 of the 14 races and earning 170 points. Second female was Rachel Ruus with 165 points. Utting won the men's Series title with 150 points over Vancouver's Graeme Wilson, who also amassed 150 points in 7 races. Utting was awarded the crown in head-to-head finishes by beating Wilson in 4 races.

August 23, 2008
Shawn Nelson
Shawn set a remarkable one-hour record today by running the tough 47K Juan de Fuca Trail in 6 hours and 15 minutes. The previous record of 7:15 was held by Rumon Carter. There were 9 runners in the 47K run from Victoria, Vancouver and Campbell River. Another 3 runners did the 28K option and 4 more ran 29K from Sombrio to China Beach. In all, 28 runners completed the rugged course. Jeff Hunt lowered his personal best 47K JdF time by one hour and 15 minutes by finishing second to Shawn in 6:25. Shane Ruljancich finished the 29K run in 3:36 while Garth Campbell did it in 3:43. The Jackal ran a 28K out-and-back option in 5:42.

August 23, 2008
Jim Finlayson, Dave Jackson and Todd Howard
Jim, Dave and Todd were the top three finishers in the second annual Harriers High Performance Invitational 10,000 Metre track race at Oak Bay tonight under ideal running conditions. All three recorded sub-31 minute performances. There were 11 starters in the 3K/5K/10K race and 9 finishers. Jim, Todd and Jason Warick, from Saskatoon, SK, were all using this race as a tune-up and fitness test before competing at the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon on September 28 in an attempt to go sub-2:18 and make the Canadian Team participating in the World Cup Team Competition in Berlin in August, 2009. Jim won the 10,000 metre race in 30:18, Dave was second in 30:21 and Todd took third in 30:56. They earned $200, $100 and $50 for their efforts. Jason was forced to withdraw with leg cramps turning the 8K split in 24:30. The winner of the 3,000 metre race was Harriers' Nick Walker in 9:08 while Sean Chester, of UVic, won the 5,000 metre race in 15:04. It was a 25 second P.B. for Chester. The top master in the 3K was Walter Cantwell in 9:41 while the top master in the 5K was Gord Christie in 16:45. About 100 spectators, mostly Harriers, showed up to cheer on the runners every one of their 25 laps as they passed the start/finish line.

August 23, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt
Jason topped the field of 198 in the 5 Peaks Whistler Enduro Mountain Race today with a winning time of 55:53. Dick Creek, from Omaha, was the final runner in 2:27:34. Second place went to Devin Matthew in 59:55 and third place was Mark Bennett, in 1:01:19, both runners are from Vancouver. The top female was Whistler's Emma Smith in 1:09:49. She was 18th overall. The shorter Sport Race was won by Ray Barrett in 28:13. There were 179 finishers in the Sport Race, 198 in the longer Enduro, 34 Kids and 29 Clydesdales for a total of 440 finishers.

August 18, 2008
Simon Whitfield
All guts, all talent. Never giving up even when the commentators gave up on him many times. Simon has always been one of my favourite people. He was our top PIH athlete at the Canadian XC Championships in Vancouver and won the BC Championships that we hosted last year at Lambrick Park. He is a class act, and today made all of Canada proud. Who else in the world could battle back so many times in the same race to succeed? I am so proud of him to take such a well deserved silver. It was a gold to me and all Victorians. Brilliant effort. We are so fortunate that he lives here, is a Harrier and is a participant in many local community races and events. Deep down inside, I think he is happy with a silver in such a hugely competitive field today. I hope he gets the bronze in 2012 in Manchester to complete his full set. He'll be 37 then and, what more could one hope for but to achieve all three colours of medals in a sport that Simon excels at on a world stage. This is the story from the Olympic website capturing his success today. They're perhaps the loneliest of Olympians. As a triathlete soldiers his way through a 1.5-kilometre swim, a 40-km bike ride and a 10-km run — especially the 10-km run — often the only sounds he hears are from his burning muscles screaming for him to stop, and from his stubborn pride telling them to shut the hell up. But in Beijing, Canada showed there's no need to go it alone. Simon Whitfield of Victoria grabbed the headlines with his electrifying final kick to seize the silver medal in the men's race, but the feat might not have been possible without a little help from his friends. Colin Jenkins of Hamilton, Ont., a Harriers club mate, eagerly accepted his role as Whitfield's bodyguard, keeping rival swimmers and cyclists at a safe distance from his more heralded teammate. Jenkins occasionally dashed out front of the cycling pack to allow the older Whitfield to take advantage of energy-saving air currents. Even Paul Tichelaar, of Edmonton, who had made it clear before the race that he would not play caddy, chipped in by feeding Whitfield information on the ever-evolving field. "Our communication was spectacular," Whitfield said. The assistance from his fellow Canadians put Whitfield in position to produce one of the most spectacular individual efforts of the Olympics. One last kick, separating himself from his teammates during the closing 10-km run, Whitfield found himself among the lead group of four — including two-time reigning World Cup champion Javier Gomez of Spain — on the final lap.Suddenly, though, Whitfield began to fade in the stifling heat, and his hopes of adding to his Olympic gold from 2000 in Sydney looked to be getting away, along with the three men in front of him. But the former champion refused to quit. Digging deep for one last kick no one knew he had, Whitfield zipped past the surprised leaders on the final straight, with the tape scarcely more than 100 metres ahead. The gutsy sprint took a little too much out of him, though, and Germany's Jan Frodeno overtook Whitfield to take the gold. Australia's Bevan Docherty claimed the bronze, with Gomez crossing the line a shocking fourth.Tichelaar finished a respectable 28th, while a joyous Jenkins skipped across the line in 50th. That made five Canadians in the top 50: a day earlier, Edmonton's Carolyn Murray was 29th and Montreal's Kathy Tremblay was 31st (Vancouver's Lauren Groves crashed out in the cycling stage) in the women's race won by Emma Snowsill of Australia. The day, though, belonged to Whitfield. "To be able to fight my way back to the podium, that was hard, that was so hard — this was a harder race than Sydney was," the silver medallist said. Imagine how hard it would've been without two pals watching your back.

August 16, 2008
Shane Ruljancich, Garth Campbell, Gary Duncan and Lara Wear
Shane, Garth, Gary and Lara all won their respective age categories at the recently completed 5-race Island Gutbuster Series which concluded at Mount Washington today. For their efforts, they each collected a new pair of running shoes! Shane was the overall Series Champion with 89 points, also winning the M30 division. Garth topped the M40 division with 58 points, Gary took the M50 division with 39 points and Lara won the F30 division with 69 points. Collectively, the foursome, along with many other Harriers, won the team title with 66 PIH finishers collecting 989 points. Frontrunners Westshore took second with 642 points and STARR was the third club with 530 points. There were 54 clubs in the team competition.

August 16, 2008
Eric Findlay, Shane Ruljancich, Lara Wear and Sonja Yli-Kahila
Eric and Shane were 1-2 overall and Lara and Sonja were 2-3 in the women's field in the final Gutbuster Series race today at Mount Washington, near Courtenay, a grueling 3 kilometre climb up a difficult ski trail. Eric's winning time was 22:09. Shane's silver medal performance was 4 seconds later in 22:13 and Alex Magdanz took third in 22:39. Duncan's Emily Solsberg was the top female in 27:39 followed by Lara in 27:49 and Sonja in 30:15. There were 66 finishers. Harriers' Andrew Pape-Salmon had a strong run finishing 5th overall in 24:14, Garth Campbell won the master's division in 24:56 and 11 year-old twins Austin and Brandon Willson finished 2-3 in the junior division in 37:50 and 40:18.

August 10, 2008
Herb Phillips
At the tender age of 68, Herb finished second overall to youngster David Matte, of Nanaimo, at the Delta 5K today. Dave won the race in 18:02 and Herb took second in 20:47. Third place went to the top female, Kimberly Bell of Calgary, in 21:23. There were 54 finishers in the 5K and another 221 in the accompanying half marathon won by Mexico City's Luis Enrique in 1:14:10. Katherine Moore, from Vancouver, was the top half marathon female in 1:25:53.

August 10, 2008
Cheryl Murphy
Cheryl placed sixth female overall in a very competitive field of elite athletes in the World Long-Distance Duathlon Championships in Geel, Belguim today. Her final time was 3:51:53. She was first in the 18K run in 1:06:27, 7th in the 74K bike in 2:07:48 and 6th in the second 9K run in 36:18 and was the only Canadian in the field. The women's winner was Catriona Morrison, from Great Britain, in 3:44:23. Second place went to Mariska Kramer-Postma, of the Netherlands, in 3:46:46 while Germany's Urlike Shwalbe took third in 3:48:21. The men's winner was Belgium's Joerie Vansteelant in 3:15:05. There were 15 elite women, 32 elite men and hundreds of age class athletes in the event.

August 3, 2008
Stephen Kilshaw and Julie Van Veelen
Steve and Julie were the top Harriers at the 29th annual Self Transcendence Triathlon and Duathlon today at Elk Lake with a cycling route through Central Saanich. The event, a Sri Chinmoy race, is the oldest and most-continuous triathlon in Canada. Steve placed 5th in the 1.5K swim, one second ahead of Mike Neill, 21:10 to 21:11. He was second fastest on the undulating 40K bike course, finishing 14 seconds behind Neill, 1:01:14 to 1:01:28, both averaging a remarkable 39 kph on a hilly out-and-back circuit of Oldfield, Old West Saanich and West Saanich Roads to the airport. Like Simon Whitfield, where real triathletes shine is in the run and Steve blitzed the fastest loop of E/B with a clocking of 34:10 for a 1:31 margin of victory over Neill who took second place overall. Their final finishing times including transitions were 1:58:42 for Steve and 2:00:23 for Neill. Harriers' Scott Dagnall took third overall in 2:03:21. The top female was Rachel McBride, from Vancouver, in 2:11:37. She was 7th overall of the 289 finishers. Julie was second female finisher, and first in her age category, in the accompanying 18th annual Duathlon, a 5K run, 40K bike and 10K run. She was 12th overall of the 53 finishers with a time of 2:29:02. The top duathlete was Abbotsford's Mike Moody in 2:07:54 and the top female was Tamsin Ansty, from North Vancouver, in 2:19:26. Besides Julie, Wendy Davies and Paul Christopher won their respective age categories in the duathlon while Harriers Mike Janes, Bob Janicki, Monique Larche and Shannon Coutts all did very well in the triathlon. There were 38 relay teams participating with the individual athletes and the total number of 456 finishers in all events was 17 more than last year's total of 439.

July 27, 2008
Shane Ruljancich, Julie Van Veelen, Chris Kelsall and Wendy Davies
Shane and Julie were honoured as the Top Dog and Top Bitch for being the first open male and female runners today in the Harriers Hare 'n Hounds 12K Mystery Run at Thetis Lake Park. Chris and Wendy were the first masters and received the Top Old Dog and Top Old Bitch trophies. The first junior was Philippe Janicki and he was recognized as the Top Puppy. The final finisher, Mike Emerson, was awarded the Long Lost Dog and the most-talkative runner, Austin Willson, got the Loudest Barking Dog trophy. There were 33 starters and 31 finishers. Cara Obee fell and scraped her face and neck about the half way point and was taken to hospital for a check-up. Her parting words to Wendy were, "Tell Bob I still want my Hare 'n Hounds shirt!" Tough lady. The Hares were John McKay and Bob Reid. The H 'n H Run was the second in a PIH 30th Anniversary celebration series including the Pilgrimage Run, held in June, and the Harriers Reunion Run and BBQ, scheduled for August. Most of the Hounds and both Hares went to the Chequered Flag for breakfast and enjoyed a lot of laughs about the run earlier at Thetis.

July 27, 2008
Scott Simpson, Gord Christie and Ben Kingstone
Scott was first overall, Gord was top master, 5th overall, and Ben was top junior, 11th overall, at the fourth annual The Zone Esquimalt 8K today. There were 198 finishers, down 73 from last year's record field of 271. Scott's winning time was 25:23, Gord ran 28:44 and Ben hit the line in 30:23. Second place went to Kris Swanson in 25:43 while last year's champion, Eric Kiauka, took third in 26:27. The top three women were Nancy Fedoruk, 32:20, Tenacious Blue, 33:49, and Alison Hunt, 35:32. Steve Osaduik won the race in 2005 and 2006, Eric won in 2007 and with Scott's victory in 2008, it makes it a clean sweep for the Harriers in all four years. The event is hosted by Peninsula Runners under the direction of Dave Milne. Other PIH runners winning their age divisions today included Shelagh Machin, Martha McNeely and Rintje Raap.

July 27, 2008
Jon Brown
Jon improved his 10K time from 31:02 last week at the Bupa Great Central Run in London to 29:31 today at the Bupa Great Wales Run in Cardiff. He placed 12th overall against a stellar field of Kenyans, Ethiopians, Qatarians, Europeans, Irish, English, Welsh, Scottish and American athletes. The overall winner was Eshetu Wondimu, of Ethiopia, in 27:45 and the top female, 50th overall, was Claire Halissey in 34:03. Jon's clocking of 29:31 is the fastest 10K time run by any BC athlete so far in 2008.

July 26, 2008
Todd Nowack
Todd was the overall winner, beating all of the 2-man and 4-man teams, in the Schick Xtreme3 Mind Over Mountain Adventure Race at Shawnigan Lake today. The event consisted of a 10K Kayak, a 30K Mountain Bike Ride, and an Orienteering Segment with 24 checkpoints. There were sections of trail running, rapelling, bushwacking, river running and some mystery events. Todd's finishing time was 4 hours, 26 minutes and 47 seconds. Second place when to the Harriers team of Shane Ruljancich/Garth Campbell in 5:01:09 and Roger MacLeod took third in 5:10:13. The top individual female, 43rd overall, was Sarah Seeds, of Courtenay, in 6:44:11. There were 73 individuals and teams finishing the long course and another 29 finishing the short course. Other Harriers who did very well on the long course included Doug Doyle, 7th in 5:23:54, Brent Chan/Sarah Newman, 15th in 5:53:04 and Sonja Yli-Kahila/Joelle McCartie 49th in 7:41:14.

July 26, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt
Jason took the bronze medal, finishing first in his M30 age category, in 49:18 at the 5 Peaks Cypress Mountain race today in North Vancouver. The winner was Shaun Stephens-Whale, of Roberts Creek, in 48:02. Vancouver's Mark Bennett placed second in 48:44. The top female was Lesia Hnatiw, from Surrey, in 59:24. There were 231 finishers in the Enduro race, 189 in the shorter Sport event, 29 Clydesdales and 16 in the Kid's Run for a total of 465 finishers in a new mountain race on the lower mainland.

July 20, 2008
Stephen Kilshaw
Steve placed an impressive second of 369 finishers at the IG Peach Classic Triathlon today in Penticton. His time was 2:01:55, just 2 minutes, 16 seconds shy of the overall win. The race champion was Jeff Symonds, from the host city, in 1:59:39. The top female was Kelly Geisheimer, of Edmonton, in 2:14:14. She was 20th overall. Steve's Victoria team mate, Scott Dagnall, also a Harrier, finished 11th in 2:08:59. Winner of the Triathlon of Compassion in Esquimalt, Victoria's Alan Boos, took 6th place in 2:04:56.

July 20, 2008
Jeff Phillips
Jeff finished first overall at the Gatineau, Quebec Triathlon today. Jeff's time was 56:06, 2:36 faster than last year when he was 7th overall. The Victoria-based triathlon team, coached by Patrick Kelly, is preparing for the national junior championships August 16 in Kelowna.

July 20, 2008
Dave Jackson
Dave finished 12th overall equaling his personal best 10K time of 30:32 at the prestigious Bupa Great Capital Run today in London's Hyde Park. The large-field, high-performance race of over 11,000 competitors was dominated by Kenyans including winner Mike Kigen in 28:42. The top female was Michelle Ross-Cope in 33:28. Dave's Harriers' team mate, Jon Brown, placed 14th overall in 31:03. Jon is coming back into form after a long layoff due to injuries. Dave is peaking at many distances while racing in England over the month of July including 1,500, 5K and 10K P.B.s.

July 19, 2008
Adam Campbell
Adam placed fourth overall today at the Canadian Mountain Running Championships at Mount Seymour. This performance earned him a spot on the Canadian Team participating at the World Mountain Running Championships in Switzerland in September. The top four men were Joe Gray, 1:01:56, from Lakewood, WA, Adrian Lambert, 1:02:44, from Edmonton, AB, Victoria's Kris Swanson, in 1:03:38 and Harriers' Adam Campbell, in 1:04:16. The top female was Suzanne Evans, three-time RVM Champion from New Westminster. Her time was 1:17:33 to place 18th overall despite going off-course for 8 minutes. She finished 4 minutes ahead of runner-up Krissy Dooling, from Edmonton. There were 30 finishers in the elite race, 50 in the community race and 5 teams in the relay division. The event started at the Parkgate Community Centre in North Vancouver and was called the Peak Challenge 12K Trail Ascent.

July 13, 2008
Mike Janes and Lowell Rockcliffe
Mike and Lowell finished 4th and 5th overall at the Triathlon of Compassion in Esquimalt today. Their times were 58:54 and 1:00:03. The race winner was Allan Boos in 55:20 and the top female was Laura Fluit in 1:03:00; she was 12th overall of the 161 finishers. Harriers with good performances in their respective age categories included Monique Larche, 2nd, Mark Ritchie, 4th, Michael Arensen, 14th, Sandy Mullen, 3rd, and Julie Van Veelen, 7th. Farisha Arensen, 11, had an excellent race to finish 4th in the 15-and-under youth division with a time of 23:35.

July 13, 2008
Cheryl Murphy and Phil Nicholls
Cheryl mounted a huge comeback on the run portion to claim victory and Phil's team of Island Runner captured top honours at the Subaru Vancouver International Triathlon today at English Bay and in Stanley Park. Cheryl finished 7th overall of the 107 finishers and started the 20.5 run almost 10 minutes behind race favourite Rachel Kiers, of Vancouver. Showcasing her brilliant running power, Cheryl passed the lead three ladies and caught Kiers in the last kilometre to win by 5 seconds, 4:37:41 to 4:37:46. Bree Wee, from Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, took third in 4:40:12. The top male was Victoria's Jasper Blake in 4:04:55 also catching the race leader, Andriy Yastrebov, of Ukraine, in the run portion to win by 38 seconds. Phil's team had an easier job of it by defeating the Vancouver team of Peter's Tri by 42 minutes, 4:09:06 to 4:51:08. There were 11 teams, 3 from Victoria, 107 finishers in the Half Ironman Distance (1.9K swim, 93K bike, 20.5K run) and another 119 finishers in the Sprint Distance (500m swim, 26K bike and 5K run).

July 12, 2008
Darren Froese
Darren captured first place overall, beating E/B 100K champion Jack Cook, of Edmonton, at the Sinister Seven 135K ultramarathon today in Alberta. The race is billed as Canada's toughest ultra with several long steep hills to negotiate. Darren's time was 17 hours, 13 minutes and 53 seconds. Second place went to Trevor Baine in 20:55:22 and the top female was Annie Rogoschewsky, 4th overall, in 22:23:24. There were 48 starters and 21 finishers in the ultra. Another 51 teams, comprised of 7 runners each, started while only 21 teams finished. Jack Cook led for 6 of the 7 stages before being forced to withdraw with 20K to go. At one point he was 48 minutes ahead of Darren, but Darren's perseverance and consistency won out in the rugged Rocky Mountains.

July 6, 2008
Scott Simpson and Cara Obee
Scott and Cara were the top Harriers today at the 6th annual Mount Douglas Gutbuster, race number 4 in a 5-race series. The event had 97 finishers in the 11k long course and another 68 finishers in the 6K short course. The total was 17 less than 2007 and 2006 where the record of 182 finishers was established. Scott finished third overall in 46:40, less than a minute behind winner, and Gutbuster Series Champion, James Richardson of CeeVacs, winning in 45:49. Second place went to Kelly Guest in 46:07. Cara topped the women's field by catching Jennie Sprigings at the second summit climb to finish 23rd overall, in 58:34. Jennie was 25th in 59:51. There were 24 Harriers in both races. Mark Nelson and Chris Callendar finished 1-2 in the short course in 25:11 and 27:44. Angela Plamondon, Wendy Davies, Garth Campbell, Gary Duncan and Paul Smith all won their age categories along with Cara, Scott, and Mark. Len Scharback and son, Ross Scharbach, long-traveled Harriers from Grand Prairie, AB, finished 5th and 3rd in their age divisions.

July 6, 2008
Jim Finlayson, Todd Howard and Mark Bomba
Jim, Todd and Mark placed 4th, 5th and 6th overall today in the LA Weight Loss 10K in Calgary. This was only 5 days following their 2nd, 3rd and 3rd place performances at the HBC10K in Victoria and Vancouver. Jim ran 31:23 in Calgary and 31:56 in Victoria. Todd ran 31:25 in Victoria and 31:40 in Calgary. Mark ran 32:11 in Calgary and 33:44 in Vancouver. The top two spots in the LA Weight Loss 10K were taken by Kenyans Moses Macharia, 30:11, and Willie Kimosop, 30:23. Richard Mosely, of Coquitlam, was third in 31:05. The top female was Lisa Harvey in 35:05 while Marilyn Arsenualt was second, and top master, in 37:28. Kip Kangogo and Maggie Finlayson won the half marathon in 1:05:08 and 1:24:33 while David Corbett and Ann-Marie Gill won the marathon in 2:32:39 and 3:08:51. There were 679 marathon finishers, 2,239 in the half, 1,703 in the 10K and 452 in the Timbits 1.2K Kids Run for a total of 5,073 finishers, up 579 from last year.

July 5, 2008
Lara Wear
Lara had a super 20 mile up-and-down race at the Chevy Chase Fell Run in Wooler, England today, finishing second in her age class, fourth female overall, in 3 hours, 56 minutes. Here is an account of her adventure: "I predicted my time would be about 3:15-3:45...and after speaking to a couple of runners before the race who thought it would take them about 3.5 hours, I decided to use them to pace myself. This lasted about 500m, the two of them (a guy and a gal) took off so quickly, as I was dropping off I modified my predicted time to about 4 hours. The course took us over the two biggest hills in the park. About 4000 ft. of elevation. Each hill was around 700-800 meters high, and the treks up were long. There are no trees and no flagging, so if you didn't know the course, you were expected to use a map and compass, or the good old method of "follow the guy in front of you". I also took my GPS watch which had the course pre-programmed into it. This was helpful on a couple of occasions.The terrain was unbelievable. Sheep fields, open moor, shale rock. Some places I was running on wet peat and each step was either a knob of heather, wet mucky soil or quicksand mud. I took one wrong step that sent my foot knee deep into the mud and I almost lost my shoe when I tried to pull it out. There were some places where there was no track at all, complete "pick your own path" and it was so gnarly I had to walk it in fear of twisting/breaking something.The climbs were brutal, the downhill insane. The downhill was a lot like Kusam Klimb but instead of sliding on snow, I was sliding on grass and heather...landed on the Kusam butt a couple of times and it hurt! But it was so fun. I had some serious techno playing on my iPod shuffle and just flew down...actually gaining a few positions while I did it.The temperature was about 9 C at the top and the wind so strong it slowed me down. There were 5 checkpoints and I carried a little gizmo that I had to scan at each checkpoint."

July 1, 2008
Simon Whitfield and Cheryl Murphy
Simon and Cheryl led 578 finishers home at the 4th annual HBC Run for Canada 10K starting and finishing on Government Street beside the parliament buildings. Simon lowered his course record set in 2005 of 31:04 to 30:45 today to collect his second victory in this race. Cheryl won her 8th race of 2008 with a time of 35:46, good for 11th overall at the HBC10K. Harriers took 2nd, 3rd and 4th in the men's race with Todd Howard, 31:25, Jim Finlayson, 31:55, and Scott Simpson clocking 32:04. Harriers masters also ran well taking the top two men's spots with Kevin Searle finishing 9th in 35:21 and Phil Nicholls registering 10th in 35:25. Nancy Baxendale was top master and 2nd female overall in 38:13. The 578 finishers was a record, up 52 from last year's high of 526.

July 1, 2008
Mark Bomba and Nanci Tinari
I know that Bobba hates to be referred to as a "master's athlete", but at age 39, BC Athletics demands that any runner over 35, rather than 40, is a master. Our two Coquitlam Harriers "masters", Mark and Nancy, shone brightly today at the Vancouver HBC10K. Mark finished 3rd overall and Nancy was 7th overall of the 838 finishers. Their times were 33:44 and 36:35. The winning male was Jerry Ziak in 32:30 and Richard Mosley took second in 33:43. Nancy, 49 years old, was the top female today out of 443 women in the race. Second place went to Kristina Rody in 36:53 and Rachel Ruus took third in 37:11.

July 1, 2008
Brian Connon and Julie van Veelen
Both Brian and Julie won their age divisions and improved their times over last year at the 21st annual Sidney Days 5K today. Brian finished 8th overall of the 171 finishers in 18:48 compared to 13th overall and 19:01 in 2007 on the same course. Julie was 2nd female finisher, 17th overall, in 20:54. Last year she was 9th female, 38th overall, in 22:23. The race was won by Jordan Rapp in 16:06 and second place went to Daniel Wells in 16:19. These two reversed their roles from 2007 where Wells won in 15:55 and Rapp took second in 16:20. The top female was Laura Fluit, finishing 16th, just 7 ahead seconds of Julie in 20:47. The 171 finishers was up 9 from last year's total of 162. Katelynn Roamge and Mike McNeill won the accompanying girls and boys 2K youth race in 8:17 and 9:44. The PIH Racewalking Team debuted with their new red club uniforms, and all 10 of them did very well under the leadership of Helen Jaques. Laura Bright won the competitive womens RW division in 30:05 and Dennis Ritchie won the men's RW division in 36:26. This was his first racewalking event and three others were first-time racewalkers at Sidney Days 5K, too.

June 28, 2008
Dave Jackson
Fresh off his victory at the Legion Twilight Shuffle, Dave finished a very respectable 5th overall in the "B" heat of a 5,000 metre race in Solihull, England, today as part of a hugely competitive BMC Grand Prix Track Meet. His time was 14:23 which was a 12 second personal best. The winner of Dave's heat was Henri Manninen, from Finland, in 14:18. There were 17 finishers in the "B" 5,000 metre event, 18 finishers in the "A" event, won by India's Surendra Singh in 13:45 and 13 more finishers in the "C" heat won by Paddy Hamilton, from Annadale/Border in 14:27.

June 22, 2008
Jim Finlayson, Todd Howard and Mark Bomba
Three of our high performance Harriers Racing Team members took fourth, fifth and sixth places overall behind three swift Kenyans in the highly-competitive Scotiabank Half Marathon today in Vancouver. The winner was Moses Macharia in 1:04:50, Josephat Ongeri was second in 1:05:15 and Danny Kassap took third in 1:07:26. Jim's, Todd's and Mark's times were 1:07:50, 1:09:15 and 1:09:51. Norm Tinkham had a good race taking the bronze medal in the M40 division in 1:14:07. He was 15th overall of the 3,584 half marathon finishers. The top female was Kenyan Florence Jepkosgei, 13th, in 1:14:04 and TC10K's winner, Lisa Harvey, 19th, from Calgary, placed second in 1:17:29. Harriers women, Nancy Tinari (32nd) and Joan McGrath (52nd), were 1-2 in the master's competition in 1:21:04 and 1:24:40. In the accompanying 5K race, Sandi Heal was the first female home and won a New Balance kit bag for her effort of 21:36. There were another 469 runners in the 5K totaling 4,053 finishers in both events.

June 22, 2008
Gerry Etcheverry
Gerry had an outstanding triathlon today at the 6th annual Coeur d'Alene Ironman. He finished 134th overall of 1,942 finishers and was 8th in the M45 division in 10:36:32. More importantly, he secured a qualifying position for the World Ironman Championships in Kona, Hawaii in October. All of his hard work wind-training, cycling, swimming and running over the winter has paid off handsomely with a ticket to Hawaii. His 2.4 mile swim was 1:06:51, his 112 mile bike ride was 5:27:00 and his 26.2 mile run was 3:53:39. Canadians topped the men's and women's fields at Coeur d'Alene with Penticton's Tom Evans winning in 8:34:22 and Victoria's Heather Wurtele winning the women's division in 9:38:58. They each pocketed $12,000 of the $75,000 in total prize money. There were 2,292 starters, 1,942 finishers and over 25,000 spectators in the downtown core of Coeur d'Alene cheering on the athletes. 80 slots were available to the Ford Ironman World Championships in Kona.

June 21, 2008
Lara Wear and Shane Ruljancich
Lara and Shane were the overall female and male champions leading a record of 321 finishers home at the 5th annual Kusam Klimb 13.8 mile extreme mountain race today near Sayward. It was almost an even split of 160 men and 161 women in a race that climbs 5,000 feet and is billed, "Are You Tough Enough?". Shane simply out-classed the rest of the field with his endurance and speed recording a winning time of 2:23:04. This was 13 minutes and 29 seconds ahead of second place finisher, Jacek Doniec, from Burnaby. He lowered his winning time of last year by over 15 minutes and broke Kevin Vallely's course record by almost 9 minutes. This may be the best race performance of Shane's life. Lara also dominated the women's field by finishing in 3:10:27 and beating runner-up Sarah Seads, of Courtenay, by more than 5 minutes. She paid the price with a sore rear end from all the sliding on her bottom in the heavy snow at the summit. For their efforts, Lara and Shane each pocketed $350 in prize money. Lara intends to put it towards a new horse trailer and Shane is using his winnings for a well-deserved holiday. Honourable mention for the Harriers goes to Shane's girlfriend, Sonya Yli-Kahila, who improved her time this year to 3:47:23 from last year's finish of 4:30:43, an astonishing 43 minute surge forward. Besides Lara (25th) and Shane (1st) Garth Campbell, Jeff Hunt, Shawn Nelson, Nick Walker, Mark Nelson, Peter Curtis, Buddy Bandhar, Craig Payne, Randy Duncan and Roger Plamondon also had great races. The Harriers placed 12 runners in the top 26 overall. The final two runners, from Port Alice and Port McNeill, finished in 11:33:15.

June 17, 2008
Dave Jackson, Cheryl Murphy and Robbie Cracknell
Dave and Cheryl were the top male and female finishers overall, and Robbie was the top junior at the 24th annual Legion Twilight Shuffle 5K tonight in Chemainus, a newly-sanctioned BC Athletics event. Dave's winning time was 15:09 and Cheryl finished 16th overall of the 536 finishers in 17:06. Robbie, just back for a few months from his athletics running scholarship in Southern California, topped the under-19 division in 17:41, good for a 27-second victory over Thomas Marrs. The course was 4.83 kilometres according to many foot pods and GPS units worn by the runners. It will be streamlined and accurately Jones-counter measured in 2009 where perhaps it will be a BC Athletics 5K Road Running Championship to celebrate the 25th annual Twilight Shuffle. The 536 finishers this year was up 80 from last year's total of 456 where it was a 4 mile (6.5K) course. The top masters were Neil Holm, of Courtenay, in 15:52 and Shawnigan Lake's Nancy Baxendale in 17:45. Dave is now traveling to England for a couple of key high-performance events while Cheryl transitions to her multi-sport mode by preparing for the New Balance Half Ironman Triathlon next Sunday. She is gearing up for the World Long Distance Duathlon Championships in Belgium on August 10.

June 15, 2008
Gary Duncan
G, the indestructible Harrier, completed his mission of running 4 races in 8 days and performed admirably at every event. Starting with the For the Love of Africa 10K at Beaver Lake on Saturday, he was the top male overall running his fastest circuit of Elk and Beaver Lakes in 37:58. He beat the second place male, Yuki O'Ysubu, by almost 2 minutes. The next day, Gary suited up for the Do it for Dad 8K at Royal Roads and was first finisher overall clocking 30:54 on a very hilly course good for a 61 second improvement over his last year's time. Ming Kang took third overall in 31:18 and Angela Plamondon was top female at DIFD in 34:40. She was 6th overall and Julie van Veelen placed 10th overall of the 291 finishers in the 8K event in 35:32. There were another 274 finishers in the 3K Fun Run and the record total of 565 runners raised over $95,000 for prostate cancer research. Two days later, Gary was at it again in Chemainus by winning the M50 division of the Legion Twilight Shuffle 5K in 17:56. He beat silver medalist, Lee Burridge, by 3 minutes, 18 seconds. G completed his fourth race on Sunday, June 22 with a 2-lap, 20K jaunt around Elk and Beaver Lakes as part of a relay team named "All Talk" in the New Balance Half Ironman Triathlon. He ran 1:19:49 and was the third fastest runner of the 63 Relay Teams.

June 15, 2008
Farisha Arensen
One of our youngest Harriers, and maybe on her way to a Junior of the Year nomination, Farisha Arensen accomplished the best race of her life today at the Victoria Youth Triathlon with her first-ever gold medal. At the age of 11, she finished 3rd overall, first girl, in 30:54. There were 58 finishers in the boys and girls race consisting of 10 and 11 year olds. The top 11 year old boy was Noah Charlton in 29:35. Farisha has been participating in the Tuesday Night Workouts with her dad, Mike, and her training has paid off in a huge leap forward. She shaved 11 minutes and 9 seconds off her time of last year on the 150m swim, 8K bike and 2K run course at UVic. She vaulted from 41st place overall to 3rd in the boys and girls race. There were a total of 206 young athletes in 6 age class divisions at the Victoria Youth Triathlon.

June 8, 2008
Sonja Yli-Kahila, Lara Wear and Shane Ruljancich
Sonja, Lara and Shane were the top Harriers today at the Westwood Lake Gutbuster in Nanaimo, race #3 in the mountain running series. Unseasonably cold and wet conditions didn't deter 232 runners from the longest races of the 5-race Gutbuster series. James Richardson, of Ceevacs, won the 22 km feature distance in 1:39:33 for his first Gutbuster win after coming close a few times in the past. Richardson's Ceevac teammate Emily Solsberg won her second Gutbuster in a row finishing in 2:11:09. Harriers were strong as usual. Lara finished 2nd overall behind Solsberg in 2:12:43 to remain in 2nd position overall in the series standings. Shane was 3rd overall in 1:42:19 in the men's race and is also 3rd overall behind Richardson and Nick Walker in the standings. Shane, Lara, Nick Walker, Nick Best, Michael Lax, Garth Campbell, Gary Duncan and Angela Plamondon all finished in the top-2 in their age groups in the half marathon. In the 9 km short course race, Sonja finished 2nd in her age group in 51:54 for her first-ever Gutbuster podium performance and medal. The short course was won by Shelby Drope in 40:01. Jessalyn O'Donnell was the top female, finishing 11th overall in 45:50. There were 83 finishers in the long course and 149 in the short course, down 13 from last year's combined total of 245.

June 8, 2008
Simon Whitfield
Already pre-qualified for the Olympic Games in Beijing, Simon gave a determined effort to finish 6th overall at the BG Triathlon World Championships in Vancouver today. He did the 2K swim in 18:35, the 40K cycle in 58:36 and the 10K run in 32:14 for a finishing time of 1:50:27 including two transitions. Spaniard Javier Gomez proved why he is the best triathlete in the world by pulling away at the 5K mark of the run to record a winning time of 1:49:48. Bevan Docherty, of New Zealand, took the silver medal in 1:50:12. Simon's team mates Paul Tichelaar, 9th in 1:50:32, and Colin Jenkins, 55th in 1:55:41, were also named to the Canadian men's team competing in August in Beijing.

June 8, 2008
Sheldon Croden
Sheldon displayed a very non-fragile running performance by completing two marathons only two weeks apart and finished them both within three minutes of each other. Starting with the ING Ottawa Marathon on May 25 where he ran 3:02:43, today Sheldon finished a very respectable 2nd overall in 3:05:44 at the Edge to Edge Marathon from Tofino to Ucuelet. The marathon winner was Chris Barth, from Campbell River, in 2:44:02. The top female was Colleen Buchwitz, of Chilliwack, in 3:33:54. There were 120 finishers in the marathon and another 255 runners in the marathon relay comprising 51 teams. The winner of the accompanying half marathon was Travis Hess, from Fort McMurray, AB, in 1:24:17. The first female was Calgary's Gabrielle Savard in 1:36:28. She was 5th overall of the 241 finishers in the half.

June 8, 2008
Leah Pells, Mark Bomba and Norm Tinkham
Our mainland Harriers were flying at Maple Ridge today collecting two firsts and one second place performance overall. Welcome back to racing Leah Pells! She was first overall beating all the men and all the women in the Run the Ridge 5K in 18:08; top Harrier, top female, top master and top runner. Second pace went to home town runner Nathan Wadhwani in 19:44. There were a total of 166 runners at Maple Ridge, 86 in the 5K and 80 in the accompanying 10K. Mark Bomba won the 10K race in 33:15, while Norm Tinkham was second overall and top master in 34:20. The top female in the 10K was Darbykai Standrick, from Mission, in 39:48.

June 7, 2008
Dave Reed and Nancy Tinari
Dave finished 2nd overall in 4:36 and Nancy was the top female, 12th overall of 105 finishers, in 5:00, at the Ambleside Masters Road Mile in West Vancouver this morning. Warren McCulloch won the event in 4:23. Dave topped the M50 division and Nancy won the F45 division. The following day she went on to win the Sandcastle City 10K Classic in White Rock, edging out Rachel Ruus 35:43 to 35:51. Ryan Hayden won the Sandcastle Classic in 30:30. There were 270 finishers.

June 7, 2008
Cheryl Murphy and Phil Nicholls
Cheryl ran a lifetime best and Phil ran a season-best at the 53rd annual Fontana Days Half Marathon near San Bernardino, CA, today under hot conditions. The race is billed as North America's fastest half marathon and the times were smoking hot. Overall winner, Kenyan Chokri Dhaquadi, hit the line in 1:02:20. Phil, 49, was top master and 4th overall of the 634 finishers. He finished in 1:10:35. Cheryl was the first female, 7th overall in a staggering time of 1:11:43. She beat the second place female, Rosalva Bonilla of Big Bear, CA, by almost nine minutes. Cheryl's time was the fastest half marathon run by a Canadian women in the last 5 years since Lioudmila Kortchagina recorded a 1:10:50 at the 2003 Scotiabank Half Marathon in Vancouver. Complete Fontana Days results are available on Active.com.

June 7, 2008
Carlos Castillo and Elaine Galbraith
The 31st annual 62 kilometre Great Walk from Gold River to Tahsis was held today and attracted 208 finishers. More importantly, the event raised $39,681 for charities. The race was won by Brad Holmes, from Nanaino in six hours flat. Carlos was second, in 6:18, eighteen minutes faster than his time from last year. Elaine was second female, in 7:27, lowering her previous best Great Walk by about twenty minutes. Husband, Andrew, also PR'd by 60 minutes with a time of 9:09. Elaine was 12th overall and Andrew was 24th of the 208 finishers. The top female was Roberta Hughes, of Courtenay, in 6:44. Conditions were ideal. The race started at 4:00am and by 5:15am there was enough light to run without a headlamp. Harriers' Rob Smith was 5th overall in 6:32. There were some bear and deer sightings along the way.

May 25, 2008
Walter Cantwell, Sandi Heal and Dee Ogden
Walter won the National Military 5K Championships, Sandi completed her first marathon and Dee showed great courage to finish the ING Ottawa Marathon today under very hot conditions for the second half of the race. Walter finished 18th overall of the 7,239 finishers in 16:44 to edge Bruce Pardy, of Kingston, by 10 seconds for the master's title. Sandi's goal time was 3:30:00 and she came very close with a 3:35:28 clocking. She was 92nd female out of 1,215 and 21st/190 in the F30 division. Dee faced severe leg cramps with 12K to go, but fought through them to finish her fourth marathon in 3:54:21, good for 41st in the master's F40 division. Kenyans swept all the major races with David Cheruiyot winning the marathon in 2:10:29, Terry Gehl winning the half marathon in 1:11:22, Julius Kiptoo, winning the 10K in 28:37 and Kyle Desormeaux taking the 5K in 15:30. There were 32,873 participants in 7 different races including 4,014 in the marathon, 9,673 in the half, 8,418 in the 10K, 7,239 in the 5K, 2,329 in the 2K, 1,196 in the Kid's Run and wheelchairs and walkers in various events. Two high performance Harriers, Mark Bomba and Nick Best, had to withdraw from the marathon with stomach problems. The top Canadian in the marathon was Matt McInnes, 16th overall in 2:16:59. Other Harriers in the marathon were Mike Lord in 2:53:05, Darren Froese in 2:57:12, Shelagh Machin in 4:35:25 and Kandise Froese in 4:52:00.

May 25, 2008
Nanci Tinari and Herb Phillips
Nancy was the top female overall and Herb was the M65 champion at the Running Room Shaughnessy 8K BC Road Running Championships today in Vancouver. The race attracted 317 finishers, 32 of which were competitive BC Athletics members which comprised 10% of the field. The race was won by non-BCA member Oliver Utting, of Burnaby, in 25:38. Second place went to Graeme Wilson, also a non-BCA member, in 26:04, and Paul Skarsgard, from Vancouver, took third in 27:38. Skarsgard was presented with the BCA top master's trophy, donated by Prairie Inn Harriers. Nanaimo's Bryan Portman placed fourth and was presented with the top open men's trophy, donated by Lions Gate Road Runners. Nancy's time was 28:30. At the age of 48, she finished 9th overall of 317 and captured the master's BC Championship trophy beating all of her younger competition. Second place female was Rachel Ruus, of Richmond, in 29:48. She was 20th and won the open women's trophy. Herb ran 32:16 and was 46th overall by completely destroying his opposition and winning the M65 division by nearly 4 minutes over Gunther Bauer of Port Coquitlam. The Prairie Inn Pioneer 8K has recently submitted a bid to host the BC 8K Road Racing Championships on January 13, 2009. We should receive word from the BCA Office as to the successful host club by October, 2008.

May 25, 2008
Jim Finlayson, Todd Howard, Angela Plamondon and Charlene Waldner
Jim and Todd finished 1-2 in the men's division and Angela and Charlene were 1-2 in the women's division at the fourth annual Oak Bay Kool Half Marathon today. Jim and Todd dominated the field by hitting the line in 1:08:03 and 1:08:18, finishing over 3 minutes ahead of bronze medalist Steve Murenbeeld. Angela ran 1:29:49, Charlene finished in 1:30:37 and Duncan's Emily Solsberg took third in 1:31:28. They were 25th, 29th and 30th overall of the 543 finishers. Gary Duncan had a great race to finish 11th overall, and first in the M50 division, in 1:23:39. Ross Morgan also captured his first-ever medal, a bronze in the M55 division. The 543 finishers was a record, up 42 from last year's total of 501, and another 205 runners participated on 41 teams in the accompanying Asics Ekiden Relay. The winning relay team was Synergy and Pen Run in 1:21:42.

May 25, 2008
Colin Dignum
About one month after competing on the PIH master men's team at the Boston Marathon along with Bruce Deacon and Mike Moon, Colin bounced back to capture the master's and overall title by winning the 3rd annual Rotary Seawall 10K Run in West Vancouver today. He finished in 34:19 to beat second place finisher Kirill Solovyev by 3 minutes, 6 seconds. Connor Llewellyn was third in 39:40. Both Kirill and Connor are in the under 19 division while Colin is in the over 40 division. There were 148 finishers. The top female was Kristl Daniels in 46:37.

May 19, 2008
Jeff Phillips
Jeff finished a mere 6 seconds behind winner Austin Horn, of Edmonton, in the 19th annual North Shore Spring Triathlon today in West Vancouver. Their times were 53:44 and 53:50. Jeff was one second behind Austin in the swim, four seconds behind in the bike and one second behind on the run. Third place went to Cole Stewart, of Langley, in 54:47. There were 18 triathletes in the elite division and another 320 in the age class divisions. Jeff was the top junior athlete and Austin was the top senior athlete.

May 11, 2008
Kirk McNally and Angela Plamondon
Kirk and Angela were the top male and top female in the 10th annual Sound and Silence 10K today on Lochside Trail and Welch Road, a race run on a half-gravel and half-pavement course. Kirk repeated as champion in lowering his winning time of 36:50 last year to 36:13 this year. Angela was crowned top female and top master in 42:20, also recording her second win at S&S; she was 17th overall of the 145 finishers. Harriers' Walter Cantwell and Simon Pearson took second and third in 37:03 and 37:19. Second female was Lindsay Williamson in 44:20 and Sooke's Jacky Eddy, 52, took third in 46:50.

May 11, 2008
Jeff Hunt
Jeff, along with ultra distance companion, Bob Wall from Campbell River, were the first two people to conquer the newly-opened 60 kilometre North Coast Trail today, on Mother's Day. The ribbon had just been cut to open the trail from Sushartie Bay to San Josef Bay on the northern tip of Vancouver Island marking the end of the Cape Scott Trail. Jeff's accomplishment accompannied his one-day finish of the 70 kilometre West Coast Trail and the 42 kilometre Juan de Fuca Trail. He just has to finish the Nootka Trail to become the first runner to complete the four major wilderness trails on Vancouver Island in less than a day per excursion. A detailed report, compelete with pictures and running advice is available on Jeff's blog http://trailadventurer.blogspot.com. This is a very interesting read!

May 4, 2008
Shane Ruljancich, Lara Wear and Gary Duncan
Shane and Lara were the top Harriers and Gary topped the M50 division at the 4th annual Mount Tzouhalem Gutbuster 11K in Duncan today. The race was won by Victoria's Kelly Guest in 57:57 and the top female was Emily Solsberg, of CeeVacs, in 1:17:11. Shane finished 4th overall with a time of 1:00:56; he was also 4th last year in 1:02:03, showing a 1:07 improvement this year. Lara attained her highest-ever finishing position by taking the silver medal as second female in 1:18:18. In 2007 she placed 6th in 1:18:59 and in 2006 she was 7th female in 1:20:53. Gary showed and even better improvement progression to collect 11th place overall in 1:07:26. He has run all four Mt. Zoo GBs and his times have dropped from 1:18:18 in 2005 to 1:12:39 in 2006 to 1:07:55 in 2007 to 1:07:26 today. He is the Harriers' Ironman of racing, frequently finishing 40 to 50 events annually!

May 4, 2008
Jim Finlayson, Cheryl Murphy and Phil Nicholls
Jim and Cheryl were the first male and female and Phil was the top master of the record number of 5,618 finishers at the Vancouver International Half Marathon today. All three finished in the top 10 overall; Jim was the race champion in 1:07:27, Cheryl was 9th in 1:15:58, a personal best effort, and Phil, 49 years old, was 8th, also in 1:15:58. He was nearly 2 minutes ahead of the next master, Dave Stephens, of Burnaby. Prairie Inn Harriers packed 6 runners in the top 9 overall with Todd Howard finishing 2nd in 1:07:45, Mark Bomba taking 6th in 1:14:40 and Nick Best, 19, winning the junior division by a staggering 17 minutes, 33 seconds, by finishing 7th in 1:15:00. Third place finisher was Kenyan Orinthal Striggles, of Augusta, GA, in 1:09:29. Three-time RVM Champion, Suzanne Evans, of New Westminster, was second female, in 1:18:55, while Whistler's Kristina Rody took third in 1:19:21. The accompanying BMO Vancouver International Marathon was won by Kenyan Thomas Omwenga in 2:15:59 and Mary Akor, of Hawthorne, CA, was the top female, 11th overall, in 2:37:54. There were 3,067 finishers in the marathon and 5,618 in the half marathon.

May 4, 2008
Carolyn Murray and Kyle Jones
Carolyn and Kyle both achieved their highest-ever finishing position at a World Cup Triathlon in Richards Bay, South Africa today. Carolyn took the gold medal over 31 other elite female triathletes in 2:03:32 to beat Australia's Felicity Abram by three seconds. Magali Di marco Messmer, from Switzerland, took third in 2:03:41. Ironically another Victorian, Kirsten Sweetland, won the 2007 BG World Cup Triathlon in Richards Bay, also her first victory, with an identical time as Carolyn's win of 2:03:32. Kirsten's margin of victory over Di marco Messmer was 15 seconds. The men's race was won by Germany's Daniel Unger in 1:52:49. Second place went to Matthew Reed, of the USA, in 1:52:50 and Russia's Hendrik De Villiers took third in the same time of 1:52:50. One second separated the top three athletes! Kyle was fourth in 1:53:00. Victoria's Brent McMahon placed 18th in 1:54:41. There were 41 finishers in the elite men's race. The next step for Carolyn and Kyle is the BG Triathlon World Championships in Vancouver June 5-8. Should either or both of them achieve a top-8 performance they are Beijing-bound for the Summer Olympics. Kirsten has the same qualifying opportunity as does Paul Tichelaar, both winners of the Shawnigan International Sprint Triathlon on May 25.

May 3, 2008
Darren Froese
Three-time 100K champion at Elk/Beaver, Darren, ran his fastest time ever on the course but had to settle for the silver medal this year at the 21st annual Harriers E/B Ultras today. Jack Cook, from Edmonton, won the feature 100K event in 7:34:03. Darren finished in 7:49:24 and Calgary's Richard Webb captured the bronze in 7:59:41. Darren's previous E/B 100K winning times were 8:17 in 2005, 8:14 in 2006 and 8:22 in 2007. Carolyn Hutniak, from Canmore, AB, won the 50 Mile race in 8:09:31 and Victoria's Rob Mackay won the 50K division in 2:36:47. Barb Bergstrom, from Sooke, won the 25 Mile Walk in 6:02:14. There were 42 starters and 39 finishers in the four ultra divisions.

April 27, 2008
Maurice Tarrant
Today, Maurice won his age division for the 19th consecutive year in the Times Colonist 10K. In 1990, the inaugural year of the race, he turned 60 and set the M60 course record of 36:37. In 1995, he turned 65 and set the M65 course record of 37:57. In 2000, he turned 70 and set the M70 course record of 41:51. In 2005, he turned 75 and set the M75 course record of 42:13. In 2010, he will turn 80 and will set an M80 course record of 45:00. In 2015, he will turn 85 and will set an M85 course record of 49:00. Today, Eric Kiauka won his first TC10K. When Maurice won his first age division at the TC10K, Eric was 11 years old. In 2015, Eric will be 36 years old and Maurice will have achieved 26 consecutive age class victories and established 6 consecutive course records. Unthinkable, but true. This is a demonstration of excellence and longevity in setting a a string of records that will never be broken.

April 27, 2008
Julie van Veelen, Gary Duncan, Shane Ruljancich and Michael Arensen
In an event that saw a huge number of personal best performances by Harriers, four club members made gigantic steps forward in the TC10K. Julie is the only Harrier out of 456 in the club that ran three consecutive 10Ks on three consecutive Sundays at Sooke River, Sun Run and TC10K and set three consecutive P.R.s. She improved her TC10K time from 1:08:56 in 1999 to 41:30 today good for an enormous bounce forward of 27 minutes, 26 seconds. Shane also ran a P.R. today of 33:44 to place 23rd overall of the 8,817 finishers, 6th of 3,450 in the M30 division. This was an improvement of 14:18 over his time of 48:02 run in 2004. Gary has run 17 consecutive TC10Ks only missing the first two events in 1990 and 1991. He has steadily seen his time drop from 45:19 in 1992 to 36:52 in 2008, an 8:27 improvement. This was also a lifetime 10K personal best for Gary at the age of 50. New member, Mike Arensen, had a breakthrough race. He ran the TC10K in 41:51 today for an improvement of 8:21 over his 50:12 time from last year.

April 27, 2008
Eric Kiauka, Jim Finlayson and Cheryl Murphy
On a day for Victorians to shine, three Prairie Inn Harriers shone the brightest at the 19th annual Times Colonist 10K today, Canada's second biggest 10K to the Sun Run held one week ago. The event saw its largest number of registrations of 10,356 plus 500 more in the Kids' Family Fun Run. Of those, a record number of 8,817 finished the 10K race with Eric and Jim finishing 1-2 in 30:31 and 30:36. Eric was running his second TC10K and earned $1,800.00 for the victory while Jim, running his 11th TC10K, settled for $1,200.00 for his second place performance. Cheryl also earned $1,200.00 for her thrilling come-from-behind silver medal performance by finishing with an identical time of 34:14 to Calgary's winner, Lisa Harvey. Cheryl made an impressive charge over the final 2 kilometres to pass third place finisher, Kirsty Smith, and almost catch Harvey, finishing a mere step behind. Their official times were 34:13.1 and 34:13.6. There was a record number of 356 teams comprising nearly 6,000 runners and the Harriers team of Eric Kiauka, Jim Finlayson, Dave Jackson, Todd Howard and Scott Simpson finished first overall to win the Island Runner Corporate Team Challenge with a combined time of 2:34:13 or an average time of 30:51 per runner. The top two masters in the TC10K were Steve Boyd, of Kingston, ON, in 30:46 and Victoria's Marilyn Arsenault in 35:50. Both won $500.00. The 2008 event raised over $50,000.00 for the Heart and Stroke Foundation of BC and Yukon bring their total to $488,000.00 donated over the last 13 years.

April 21, 2008
Bruce Deacon
Bruce ran an incredible 2:23:56 today at the 112th annual Boston Marathon to place 20th overall of over 25,000 entrants. He was second master and a mere 20 seconds behind winner Gino Van Geyte, of Belgium, who finished 19th overall in 2:23:36. You would think that in a race of this gigantic proportion and of this quality of runner, that the master athletes might be spread amongst the top 100 or 200 positions. Not so in Boston, where they packed in at the 19th, 20th and 21st spots. The bronze medalist, Russian Oleg Strizhakov, finished 21st overall, 20 seconds behind Bruce, in 2:34:16. The race winners were Kenya's Robert Cheruiyot, in 2:07:46, and Ethiopia's Dire Tune, in 2:25:27. Second and third place both went to Moroccans, Al Bouramdane, 2:09:04, and K. El Boumlili, 2:10:35. The second female was A. Biktimirova, from Russia, in 2:25:27, while Rita Jeptoo, of Kenya, took third in 2:26:34. The Harriers had a master's team entered which did very well anchored by Bruce's stellar 2:23:56 performance. Colin Dignum ran 2:45:37 to claim 53rd in the M40 division, 301st overall, and Mike Moon finished in 3:00:05 to place 277th M40 and 1,256th overall. Bruce's splits were 32:24 for 10K, 1:06:11 for 20K and 1:40:18 for 30K. He hit the halfway mark in an impressive 1:09:48.

April 20, 2008
Kirsty Smith and Jim Finlayson
Kirsty and Jim were the highest Harriers finishers in the prestigious nearly 60,000-strong field of the Sun Run today, Canada's largest 10K road race. Jim was 8th overall in 30:16 while Kirsty was 3rd female in 34:12. There were 59,179 registrations and 44,169 finishers in the event. Kenyans led the way in the men's race with Festus Langat winning in 29:26 and Philip Koech finishing second in 29:36. Richmond's Ryan Hayden placed third for the second consecutive year in 29:37. Steve MacIntyre, from Columbia, took fourth in 30:09, while Coquitlam's Mark Bomba made a strong comeback in the final 3 kilometres to claim fifth place overall in 30:10. The top five women were Genet Gebregiorgis, from Ethiopia, in 33:36, Calgary's Lisa Harvey, 33:59, Harriers Kirsty Smith, 34:12, and Cheryl Murphy, 34:14, and Edyta Sieminska, from Edmonton, in 35:11. The first masters were Steve Boyd, from Kingston, ON, 31:04 and Victoria's Marilyn Arsenault, 35:14. Harriers who ran personal best times at the Sun Run included Nick Best, 33:47, Cheryl Murphy, 34:14, Kevin Searle, 34:20, Chris Kelsall, 37:16, and Julie van Veelen, 41:50. Other Harriers were Victoria Select Team members and ran very well including Dave Jackson, 30:40, Eric Findlay, 32:20 and Ian Hallam, 33:03.

April 13, 2008
Simon Whitfield
Sydney Olympic Champion Simon Whitfield of Canada continues his quest for another Olympic title with a win at the Ishigaki BG Triathlon World Cup today. Simon showed a field of top Olympians that he still has power in his legs to claim his 11th world cup title, in a time of 1 hour 51 minutes and 12 seconds. Close behind in second was 2007 big prize money winner Rasmus Henning of Denmark, 10 seconds back. Rounding out the podium was Russia’s Ivan Vasiliev another 11 seconds back, who just managed to outlast a charging Peter Robertson of Australia. In fifth was Britain’s Tim Don, who also ran back from over a minute deficit after the bike to finish in the top-5. "That was good, a great way to start the year. I've been coming here for 12 years and never been close to the podium," said Simon after his win, which ties him for second all-time world cup wins with Kiwi and fellow Olympic gold medalist Hamish Carter. “When I was running along I was thinking, 'Come on, this might be my last time here so I have to win this thing’. It's my first win in Japan so it's a thrill, never done that." Simon had a good swim, a good bike and a great run, his triathlon trademark finishing kick, in achieving a 31:42 split for the run.

April 13, 2008
Nick Walker, Charlie Ireland, Angela Plamondon and Julie van Veelen
Nick won the overall Series Championship, Charlie rebounded from a very serious accident, Angela was top master and Julie had her highest-ever finishing position at the 8th annual Sooke River 10K today, the 8th and final race of the Frontrunners Island Series. After trailing team mate Eric Findlay for the first seven races, Nick had to achieve 825 points to overtake Eric for the championship title. Nick ran an outstanding 32:33 at Sooke to tally 835 points and replace his only sub-800 performance at Cobble Hill. In the end Nick averaged 821.6 points for his best 5 races, while Eric finished second with 819.6 points. Angela was second female overall and top master in 41:17 running in her own back yard as both she and Roger live in Sooke and train often on Sooke River Road. Julie handily won the W30 age division by over 3 minutes with a time of 42:02, a personal best. She finished as third female overall in the race and won her age division in the Series by a comfortable 52 points over Stephanie Croft. About 6 months ago Charlie suffered a serious bicycle accident where he lay unconscious in hospital in a coma for 4 days. He gradually recovered his will, strength and determination to return to an active lifestyle. Today, Charlie entered his first race of 2008 with a great 5th place performance in the M70 division in 54:53. Welcome back Charlie! Gary Duncan had a great race achieving a personal best 10K of 37:03, attaining his highest points total of 733, and placing in his highest-ever finishing position of 15th overall. The Sooke River 10K was won by Vancouver's Ryan Day in 31:39 and the top female was Melissa Ross, from ORCA, in 40:11. There were 355 finishers, up 19 from last year's total of 336. The Series Champions were Nick Walker and Marilyn Arsenault. The master's champions (40+) were Marilyn Arsenault and Cliff Kennell.

April 6, 2008
Richard Lee
Richard, 46, placed second overall of 163 finishers at the Spring Ahead 5K in Misson today with a time of 18:17. Paul Reimer, 51 years old, won the race in 17:19 and Leslie Stevens, 42, was the top female in 20:57, an event where the older and younger runners dominated. Of the top ten men, four were 40 or older, two were under 19 and two were under 15. Of the top ten women, two were over 40, three were under 15 and one was under 19. It is very unusual to see only one M20 and one M30 in the top ten men and two F20 and two F30 in the top ten women. The majority of runners were from Mission, Coquitlam, Chilliwack, Abbotsford, Langley and Maple Ridge.

April 6, 2008
Meghan Day and Nick Walker
Meghan made a successful return to racing after giving birth to her third boy only 6 months ago. She finished 12th overall to dominate the women's field at the Royal Roads 11.5K Gutbuster, Race #1 of 5 in the Island Series. Her time was 55:37. Harriers swept the top three women's spots with Cara Obee placing second in 1:01:18 and Jo Rosen taking third in 1:01:34; Jo was also first master. Nick was top Harrier and second overall, in 50:42, of the 135 long course finishers. Kelly Guest won the race in 49:27 and Harriers' Shane Ruljancich ran a very solid third in 51:11. Andrew Pape-Salmon had a particularly strong race to finish 13th in 55:44. UVic's Sean Chester won the 6K short course in 28:05 and Karen Larabee, of Club Mud, took the women's title in 34:55. She was 12th overall of the 93 short course finishers. . There were 20 Harriers in the long race and 3 more in the short one. Last year's total for both courses was 229 and this year GB#1 attracted 228 finishers.

April 6, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt and Joan McGrath
Jason finished second overall today in 1:07:00 and Joan was second female, and top master in 1:22:10, at the April Fool's Run Half Marathon from Gibsons to Sechelt on the Sunshine Coast. Ryan Day won the race in 1:06:23 and Mark Bomba took third in 1:08:44. Suzanne Evans, 3-time RVM Champion from New Westminster, won the women's race in 1:18:30. She was 7th overall of 298 finishers. Third place female was Susanne Russell in 1:23:08. Two other Harriers had outstanding efforts at the Fools Run Half. Doug Alward, Terry Fox's traveling companion on the Marathon of Hope in 1980, finished 6th overall in 1:18:24 to win the M50 division. Jason's wife, Taeko, finished 5th in the F35 division in 1:29:43 while running at 3.5 months pregnant. Very ironic that Meghan Day wins Royal Roads and Ryan Day wins the the Fool's Half on the same day. Also, Meghan was born on the Sunshine Coast and raced in Victoria following a pregnancy, while Taeko raced on the Sunshine Coast and plans to move to Victoria during a pregnancy.

March 30, 2008
Eric Findlay, Kevin Searle and Michael Lax
Eric won his second 2008 Series race and perhaps wrapped up the men's championship title, Kevin won his age class and Michael took a silver at the Merville 15K today, Race #7 in the 8-race Frontrunners Island Series. The top three men were Eric Findlay in 50:48, Royd Burkart in 51:36 and Bryan Portman in 52:40. The top three women were Nancy Baxendale 1:00:33, Jessalyn O'Donnell 1:01:41 and Marilyn Arsenault 1:02:01. Kevin recorded his highest points total ever, 780, in 33 Island Series races to date. He has run a personal best at every race in the Series this year and hopes to nail 34 and change in the Sun Run and TC10K and win the M45 division. He ran 53:36 today. Michael ran his fastest Series race in 8 years to record 745 points and place second in the highly-competitive M50 division. He recounted his race, "I came second behind Wayne Crowe, and nipping Frank Graham by 4 seconds. I placed 12th overall in 56:06, that's equivalent to a 2:49 marathon...!! I went out quicker than I had planned, but I had based my 'planning' on what I ran at Comox; it turns out Comox was just a warmup! I ran 10 seconds behind Frank for most of the race. I caught up to him at the 10k mark, ran with him for about 3k, then went ahead with 2k to go. It was brutal coming up the last stretch of about 800 metres as I could hear him trying to get by me. I was tying up like crazy, but I managed to hold him off. God, did it feel good! What is most encouraging about the longer Comox and Merville races is that I did not taper for the Series; I have been averaging 80 mpw in preparation for the Vancouver Marathon." There 28 Harriers and 294 finishers at Merville, down 2 from last year's total of 296.

March 29, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt and Cheryl Murphy
Jason and Cheryl were both first to finish the competitive Spring Classic 5K in Stanley Park today. The event is hosted by Vancouver Falcons Athletic Club. Jason led the men's field for a 4 second margin of victory over Graeme Wilson 15:50 to 15:54. Paul Krochak took third in 16:00. Cheryl's winning time was 17:18 which placed her 17th overall of the 263 finishers. Running mate, Phil Nicholls, was one second ahead of Cheryl to take the bronze in the M45 division. Other Harriers in the race were Aaron Holmgren, 10th in 16:16, and Nancy Tinari, 2nd F45 in 18:25. The second female overall was Kristina Rody, of Whistler, in 17:39, and Richmond's Rachel Ruus took third in 18:13. Cheryl, Kristina and Rachel will all be going head to head once again in the Sun Run and the TC10K on April 20 and April 27.

March 21, 2008
Joanne Rosen and Lara Wear
Jo and Lara were second and third females to finish the second annual Fletcher's Challenge 12K trail race today, an event initiated to honour runner and TC sportswriter, Gavin Fletcher, who lost his life in a car accident in December, 2006. Nanaimo Frontrunners' John Loewen won the rugged mountain race in 44:09 while Wendy Simms, also of Nanaimo Frontrunners, won the women's division in 47:08. She was 5th overall. Jo was 7th finisher in 48:29 and Lara was 11th in 51:57. Other Harriers making the trip to Westwood Lake, Nanaimo, were Mark Ritchie, 8th in 49:07, and Christine Little, 15th in 53:28. Rumon and Aviva Carter, Fletcher's close adventure racing friends, finished in 1:03:11. Last year's winner, Stefan Jacobsen, ran with his new wife, and Ceri and Stefan finished in 53:07 and 53:08, good for 13th and 14th overall. The 12K event attracted 75 finishers, down 30 from the inaugural year of 2007 where there were 105 finishers. More importantly, the 12K runners and 6K walkers raised over $7,000 to help underprivileged children gain access to sports.

March 16, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt, Angela Plamondon and Chris Kelsall
Jason and Angela were the top Harriers, BBB winners, and Chris ran his fastest half ever at the 27th annual Comox Valley Half Marathon today. There were 498 finishers, up 9 from last year's total of 489. Vancouver runners dominated the top positions sweeping 5 of the top 6 spots. Richmond Kajaks' Jerry Ziak won the race in 1:07:07. Second place went to Vancouver's Ryan Day in 1:07:59 and Jason, from New Westminster, was third in 1:09:09, one day after racing the St. Patrick's Day 5K in Stanley Park and finishing fourth there in 15:30. The top women in both the senior and master divisions were also from the lower mainland with Whistler's Kristina Rody winning in 1:19:57 and VFAC runner, Helen Ritchie winning the master's title in 1:28:01. Angela was second master, 5th female, and 53rd overall in 1:28:48. Chris ran his fastest Series race in 4 years and his second fastest ever in 35 races with a 1:23:51 clocking. He achieved a season high of 717 points, only one point shy of his all-time best of 718 which he scored at the Cedar 12K in 2004. Brian Connon set a M60 course record in 1:24:20, breaking Mile Ellis's mark of 1:25:42 set in 1999. Julie van Veelen did the unthinkable by reducing her half marathon P.B. by an astonishing 19 minutes and 24 seconds. Her time of 1:31:19 won the bronze in the F30 division. There were 42 Harriers in the race and they amassed 6 gold medals, 7 silvers and 6 bronzes in their respective age classes.

March 15, 2008
Dave Jackson, Jason Terauchi-Loutitt and Bruce Deacon
Dave, Jason and Bruce raced 2-3-4 through the first mile in 4:42, 4:49 and 4:49 and went on to finish 2nd, 4th and 6th overall in the fastest 5K footrace in BC so far this year, the St. Patrick's Day 5K in Stanley Park, Vancouver. The St. Pat's event boasted the most competitive field and the highest number of finishers compared to five other 5K races to date including Bazan Bay in Sidney, Lakeside in Penticton, Chilly Chase in Langley, Shamrock in Abbotsford and TC Clinics in Esquimalt. The top three men at the St. Patrick's 5K were Graeme Wells in 14:39, Dave Jackson, one second behind with a great P.B. of 14:40, and Oliver Utting in 15:29. Jason was 4th in 15:30 and Bruce was 6th overall, top master, in 15:35. The top three women were Victoria's Marilyn Arsenault in 17:09, 3 seconds faster than 3-time RVM champion, Suzanne Evans, who finished in 17:12, and Harriers' Joan McGrath took third in 18:24. The race had 675 finishers and featured three running legends - Dave Campbell, Gary Barber and Al Klassen. All three won the Canadian CIS 1,500 Metre Championships in the 1980s. Today Gary and Dave finished 4th and 11th in the master's division. In a unique format, the race only recognized two age categories, open (0-39) and master's (40+). Good old fashioned racing!

March 15, 2008
Carolyn Goluza
Carolyn, winner of the 2007 Kusam Klimb in 2:56:21, chopped one full hour off her personal best time of 9:40 by running the Juan de Fuca Marine Trail today and finishing with her boyfriend in 8 hours, 40 minutes. The run was not a competition, but a group wilderness run on the spectacular, coastal trail spanning 47 kilometres from China Beach, near Jordon River, to Botanical Beach, near Port Renfrew. Other Harriers and friends on the run included Jeff Hunt, Bob Wall and Ludovic Calvier who all finished in 7:40 and E/B Race Director, Carlos Castillo, and Nanaimo's Brad Holmes who finished in 9:05. It was a personal best performance for all seven runners on the difficult, multi-day hiking trail. Holmes went on to run the Comox Valley Half Marathon the following day. I guess this 47K wilderness trek on Saturday was a good warm-up for his 21K race on Sunday!

March 9, 2008
Steve Osaduik, Richard Lee, Nancy Tinari and Joan McGrath
Steve finished fourth overall, Richard won a M45 silver medal, Nancy was third female, first in the F45 division, and Joan took silver in the F45 division at the second annual Harry's Spring Run-off 8K today held in Vancouver, run on the seawall at Stanley Park under ideal conditions. The overall winners, Ryan McKenzie, of Windsor, ON, and Calgary's Lisa Harvey, both took home $1,000 as race champions. The top five men were Ryan McKenzie, 23:39, Ryan Hayden, 23:54, Jerry Ziak, 24:10, Steve Osaduik, 24:12, and Steve Murenbeeld, 25:25. The top five women were Lisa Harvey, 28:03, Kristina Rody, 28:33, Nancy Tinari, 29:33, Rachel Ruus, 29:37, and Joan McGrath, 30:08. There were 802 finishers at Harry's 8K. On the same day Penticton hosted the BC Championships at the Lakeside Resort 5K which had 223 finishers. That event was won by Theodore Hunt, of Kelowna, in 16:41 while Vernon's Chantelle Deacon took the women's crown in 19:27. There were also 634 finishers at the Bazan Bay 5K in Sidney. Andrew Russell won the men's race in 15:17 while Marilyn Arsenault won the women's race in 17:21. March 9 was certainly a busy race day, collectively attracting 1,669 finishers in Penticton, Victoria and Vancouver events.

March 9, 2008
Julie van Veelen, Simon Pearson, Craig Payne and Gary Duncan
Julie, Simon, Craig and Gary all took giant steps forward by absolutely destroying their personal best times at the Bazan Bay 5K today. Julie jumped almost 10 minutes better than her first 5K, 29:04 run at UVic in 1999. She finished Bazan in 19:40, an improvement of 2 minutes and 19 seconds over her time of last year, and achieved an increase from 598 points in 2007 to 758 points in 2008. In five Series races to date, Julie has 4 gold medals in the F30 division. Simon vaulted from 24:44 in 2005, to 20:00 in 2006, to 20:49 in 2007 to an outstanding 17:36 in 2008. He has seen his time improve by 7:08 in 4 years and has seen his overall finishing position rocket up 341 places. He finished 379th in 2005 and was 38th today. Craig also enjoyed a 5:05 improvement at Bazan Bay by lowering his time of 22:33 in 2004 to 17:27 in 2008. He has moved from 229th position to 35th. In 69 Series races to date, Gary, 50, achieved his highest-ever points total of 733 and ran his fastest-ever race with a 3:33 pace per kilometre or 5:42 pace per mile. In 5 years he has seen his Bazan Bay time improve as follows: 19:37, 18:37, 18:24, 18:13 to 17:44 today. Gary's hard work at TNWs and leadership at the Saturday morning Thetis Lake trail runs is paying off in his best season with tremendous race results.

March 9, 2008
Ian Hallam, Eric Findlay, Kyla Coates and Jen MacLean
Harriers placed second and third overall in both the men's and women's divisions today at the 7th annual Bazan Bay 5K, a race that reverted back to the popular Lochside Drive course of 2006 after an experiment last year with a downtown loop of the business community of Sidney. The race is hosted by Team West Coast and, prior to 2002, it was an 8K event. The overall race winners were Andrew Russell, from the National Triathlon Centre, in 15:17, and IRRs Marilyn Arsenault, in 17:21, breaking Joan McGrath's master's course record set last year by 20 seconds. Ian was second, in 15:26, following his first-ever victory at the Cedar 12K one month ago. Eric was third, in 15:29, following his 1/100th of a second victory two weeks ago at the Hatley Castle 8K. Kyla was second female, in 17:56, lowering the junior women's course record by 5 seconds. It was her best performance in 2008 by improving from 7th at Pioneer with 707 points, to 6th at Hatley Castle with 682 points, to a season-best of 2nd female at Bazan Bay with 733 points. Jen returned to racing after a two month period of illness and injury to finish 3rd at Bazan Bay, in 18:04, collecting 825 points. This was also an improvement over her only other Series race in 2008, the Pioneer 8K, where she placed 5th with 802 points. Honourable mention goes to Brian Connon, who broke Bill Hollingshead's M60 record of 18:36 by 11 seconds with his new record time of 18:25. Ian and Kyla won the Bob's Bonus Buds. Race conditions were ideal today. There were 634 finishers at Bazan Bay, down from their Series-high total of 1,147 finishers last year in the pouring rain. Unfortunately potential F45 Series winner, Nancy Baxendale, and M75 silver medalist John Woodall both thought the race started at 11:00 a.m., similar to the other 7 races in the Frontrunners Island Series. When they showed up at 10:00 a.m., the race was over and one of their qualifying events had slipped away.

March 8, 2008
Jason Terauchi-Loutitt and Colin Dignum
Harriers placed first and second overall at the Yeti Snowshoe 10K Canadian Championships Saturday at Cypress Mountain. Jason won the event in 50:35, Colin was second overall, and top master, in 51:14 while Shaun Stephens-Whale, of Roberts Creek, finished third, and was top junior in 53:04. Cheryl Beattie, of North Vancouver, won the women's race in 1:02:34. There were 78 finishers in the 10K race and another 84 finishers in the 5K race. This was the fourth snowshoe race of the Yeti Series starting at Mount Washington on Jan. 19, moving to Mt. Seymour on Feb. 2, then Grouse Mountain on Feb. 16, before concluding with the National Championships at Cypress Mountain today. Here is an account of the race by Jason, "I seemed to have taken quite a bit of identity in snowshoe racing despite only being on them for 4 times in the past two years. I guess looking back at the 2004 Billy Loutitt Winter Duathlon that I did as my last big snowshoe event in Athabasca AB, I knew my grandfather and great grandfather would have been proud if I could do well. That race was to honour my great grandfather and it was an event which was snowshoe running with cross-country skiing in the middle for a total distance of over 40K with 10+ pounds of canned food on my back with a pack on... dropping a little food off along the way. Today's race was one were I took off from the start knowing that I had to go for it and also from not knowing the course. In snowshoe racing if you get behind someone on singletrack with high snowbanks on the side... your race is done. Needless to say this course was laid out incredibly by the organizers and allowed for passing in many areas. Probably good I didn't know about that as taking off was the way I needed to run it. Some great competition was out on the course with the second place runner and Harriers team mate, Colin, right behind me after the first 5K loop. I was getting a little worried and knew I just needed to get my pace up. The first 5K was done in 25:30 with the finish time having the last loop at 25:05. The awards ceremony also rewarded the King and Queen of the Mountain for the fastest overall race times in the Series. Wow... taking the title of the 'King of the Mountain' is something that represents my ability and everyone's ability to overcome those mountains in our lives. When running and snowshoeing there is nothing like the feeling you get when trail or mountain running amongst the peaks. Knowing and realizing how far you have come but leaving humbled knowing you'll have to climb back up every time is part of that magical sacrifice to be better."

March 8, 2008
Eric Kiauka
Eric came second in a thrilling finish in the 3,000 metre race at an indoor track meet in Seattle today, establishing a personal best by 7 seconds. The University of Washington was the venue for the Last Chance Qualifier Meet that featured 17 top-level athletes in the 3,000 metre race. After trailing eventual winner, Jeff Scull, a Canadian training in Syracuse, Eric took the lead and pushed the pace for the last 1,000 metres. He almost held on for the win but was nipped by Scull by 2 tenths of a second. Scull mounted a blazing finishing kick to overtake Eric and win 8:04.95 to 8:05.15. The two Canadians completely destroyed the rest of the field lapping all of the athletes many times before hitting the finishing tape. Ofer Barniv, from Team Good River, finished third in 8:20.23. Eric has been training big mileage with Steve Osaduik over the last month and this high-quality, high-distance running paid a huge dividend today with a personal best track performance. Following the event Eric summed up his race, "I think a sub-8 is a real possibility this year, but I am excited because the race shows that a sub-8:32 steeplechase 3,000 is in the cards if everything goes well, which is the B standard for the Olympics." Eric and Steve left for Flagstaff, AZ, immediately after the race for some altitude training with Simon Whitfield, Kyle Jones, Reid Coolsat and others. They will return for the TC10K.

March 2, 2008
Gary Duncan
For the second time in 3 years, Gary finished in first place at the 3rd annual Layritz 8.5K Trail Pursuit held today, a unique event where the older age groups start first and the younger age groups are sent off later in staggered start times based on their age on race day. G, the Harriers running machine, finished with a time of 44:05 on the clock. His actual running time was 35:04 with a 9:01 handicapped start. PIH team mates Nick Walker and Paul O'Callaghan placed 2nd and 3rd overall with clock times of 46:32 and 47:33. Nick actually ran the fastest time on the 8.5K course with a blistering 32:28 performance to go with his 14:04 handicap. Paul's running time was 35:33 with a 12:00 handicap. The top female was Alison Dickson in 1:01:28, running time of 50:43, handicap of 10:45. There were only 11 finishers, down from 40 last year. In 2006, the inaugural Layritz year, the event attracted 10 finishers. Congratulations are in order to Adam Lawrence for initiating and directing the race for the last 3 years. Let's hope the numbers rise again next year or the race may face cancellation.

March 1, 2008
Cheryl Murphy and Phil Nicholls
Both Cheryl and Phil had outstanding performances today in the deep south of USA at the Snickers Marathon Bar Marathon in Albany, Georgia. Cheryl ran a brilliant debut marathon, at the age of 38, to place 8th overall in 2:40:12. She was second female to Kenyan Janet Cherobon who finished 5th overall in 2:37:27. Cherobon, training in Lawrenceville, GA, shattered the women's course record by an astonishing 55 minutes, 10 seconds. Cheryl's time was the fastest marathon recorded this year, and in fact it was the fastest by any BC female within the last five years. This 2:40:12 performance qualified her for the IAAF World Marathon Championships in Berlin next year as part of Team Canada. Phil was 6th overall and top master in 2:38:29, his fastest marathon and his first sub-2:40 in 8 years of running as a master since he turned 40 on April 22, 1959. Second place master Phil Shires, of Charlotte, NC, was a mere 10 seconds behind in 2:38:39. The race was won by Kenyan Simon Sawe in 2:27:44, breaking the course record by 3 minutes, 10 seconds. Sawe trains in Sante Fe, NM. There were 371 finishers in the Snickers Marathon and another 386 finishers in the accompanying half marathon. They offered over $12,000 in prize money with $3,000, $2,000 and $1,000 going to each of the top three male and female runners. All in all, it was an excellent day for the only two Canadians in the race, Cheryl and Phil.

February 24, 2008
Steve Sullivan and Kevin Searle
Steve won his first-ever gold medal at an Island Series event and Kevin claimed top masters' honours today at the Hatley Castle 8K, Race #4 in the Frontrunners Series at Royal Roads. Steve crushed the M60 field in winning his age class by nearly 4 minutes with an excellent time of 32:33. He was 51st overall and first of 18 in his age division. Kevin finished 11th overall, of the 385 finishers, in 29:04, topping 30 other runners in his M45 division and another 26 runners in the M40 division. Amazingly, 16 Harriers won their respective age categories including Eric Findlay, Stephen Kilshaw, Jeff Phillips, Shane Ruljancich, Kevin Searle, Gary Duncan, Steve Sullivan, Herb Phillips, Garfield Saunders, Maurice Tarrant, Kirsty Smith, Alexa Coates, Charlene Waldner, Julie van Veelen, Gwyn Woodson and Wendy Davies. Of the 74 Harriers in the race, this represents 22% of them that achieved gold medals. A further 9 Harriers won silver medals in their age classes while 7 more claimed bronze. At the end on the day 32 PIHers finished on the podium.

February 24, 2008
Meghan Huzzey and Linda Campbell
On the same day as Hatley Castle, Harriers Race Director Helen Jaques, hosted the 10th annual Racewalk Victoria on the paved Galloping Goose trail attracting 28 racewalkers from many parts of Canada. There were three distances to choose from - 1.5K, 5K and 10K and the races included a 'novice' division and a 'competitive' division. Meghan, 22, won the Open Women's 5K with a time of 25:41 and Linda, 51, won the Master Women's 5K in 32:55. Second open 5K racewalker was Nicola Evangelista, of Vancouver, in 28:18, and Surrey's Bev Larsson took third in 33:24. 14 year old, Rachel Inglis, from Victoria, won the 'novice' 1.5K race in 7:55 while Ladysmith's Diane Clark won the 'novice' 5K race in 36:41. Evan Dunfee, 17, and Inaki Gomez, 20, both of Vancouver tied for the 10K victory, in 46:47, and Laura Bright, 19, from Victoria, took the women's 10K crown in 1:03:01. Racewalkers came from Toronto, Edmonton, Vancouver, Surrey, Campbell River, Parksville, Ladysmith, Cobble Hill and Victoria to support the event.

February 24, 2008
Eric Findlay, Nick Walker and Kirsty Smith
Today, at the Hatley Castle 8K, the 200+ spectators at the finish line were treated to the closest, most thrilling race in the 26-year history of the Island Series with two Harriers finishing 1/100th of a second apart! In horse racing a photo finish shows which horse won by a nose. In track racing, a photo finish shows which runner won the 100 metre race by his torso crossing the line. Horse races and track races are usually won by fractions of a second. Today we needed a photo finish at Royal Roads to determine whether Eric Findlay or Nick Walker actually won Race #4 in the eight-race Frontrunners Island Series. The finish-line judge gave the nod to Eric who out-leaned Nick to take the victory. Both were timed in 26:28, twenty-three seconds ahead of bronze-medalist Stephen Kilshaw. Within the last 50 metres of the race the lead changed hands five times with either Eric of Nick surging to pull 1/2 second or so ahead of each other. With 5 metres to go, both were stride-for-stride, shoulder to shoulder and torso-to-torso. Eric's 1/100th second triumph gave him his second overall victory at Hatley Castle as he won the race last year in 26:09. Kirsty, on the other hand, totally dominated the women's field breaking Judith Leroy's course record by 21 seconds to win easily in 28:40. She was 9th overall of the 385 finishers, down 7 from last year's total of 392. Second female was Marilyn Arsenault in 29:30 and Nancy Baxendale took third in 31:20. Eight of the top ten finishers were Prairie Inn Harriers and there were 74 Harriers in the race comprising about 20% of the field.

February 24, 2008
Christine Thate
The Runner-of-the-Week is not always awarded to the swiftest in the race, sometimes it goes to the most improved. Christine Thate joined the "10-Minute Club" today at Hatley Castle and improved her time by an outstanding margin of almost 10 minutes! Her previous three Hatley Castle races have resulted in finishing times of 59:11, 58:39 and 59:28, just last year. Today she ran 49:53. Her points sky-rocketed from 430 last year to 488 this year. Her finishing positions improved from 395th, 487th, 387th to 359th today, a jump of 128 places between 2002 and 2008. Christine celebrated her excellent race with a stop at the View Royal Casino to test her luck at the slot machines. Fellow-Harrier, Susan Martin, visited the same casino last week and was hugely rewarded to drop a coin in the slots and win $128,000.00! Congratulations to Christine for her race and to Susan for her luck on the machines. If Christine wins at the slot machines, it could be her ticket to early retirement. We should all be so lucky!

February 22, 2008
Jason and Taeko Terauchi-Loutitt
Today, two more high performance runners from New Westminster joined the Harriers. Jason can well be remembered for his stunning 2-minute victory at the 2005 Mount Douglas Gutbuster. He went on to represent Team Canada in two World Championship Mountain Races in Italy and New Zealand. Jason also finished second overall in the 2005 Royal Victoria Marathon in 2:28 and was 4th in the 2006 RVM in 2:30. In the 2006 Vancouver First Half half marathon he P.R.'d by finishing second to Steve Osaduik in 1:06. His wife, Taeko, is a very talented athlete as well. She is a Japanese 14-year professional marathoner with a P.B. of 2:27. They met on a Relay Race around the world last June and are expecting their first child in October. On September 4, 2007, twenty-one runners strode across the finish line in New York City. Together, relay-style, they traveled 95 days straight over 15,200 miles to spread the word that a global water crisis exists for 1.2 billion of our fellow human beings. You can follow Jason's and Taeko's adventures on the website www.blueplanetrun.org. In 2008, Jason plans to run in three Canadian Championships including snow shoeing, marathoning and mountain racing. His two international events will be Mountain Racing Championships - the World Long Distance Championships and World Mountain Trophy Championships. Welcome Jason and Taeko!

February 17, 2008
Todd Howard
Todd ran a personal best 2:25:44 to anchor Team Canada to a bronze medal performance at the AT&T Austin Marathon in the 30 degree heat of Texas today. Other Canadian team mates included Peter Vail, 2:33:12, Nicole Stevenson, 2:44:46, and Suzanne Evans, 2:48:14. Todd was 8th overall of the 5,138 finishers. 3,094 were men and 2,044 were women. Peter was 14th male, Nicole was 3rd female and Suzanne was 4th female. The race was won by Jacob Frey, from Conshohocken, PA, in 2:20:38, and the top female was Lucy Hassell, from London, England, in 2:36:26. Team USA won the team competition with 8 points, Team Kenya was second with 15 points, Canada took third with 15 points, Great Britain placed fourth with 17 points and Team Malawi was fifth with with 44 points. Over $50,000 was up for grabs in prize money including $15,000 to the winning team.

February 17, 2008
Nick Walker, Ben Kingstone, Gary Duncan and Lawrence McLagan
Nick was 2nd overall while Ben, Gary and Lawrence all won their age categories by a substantial margin at the third annual Bear Mountain 3.5K Summit Challenge today, a unique race that is uphill every step of the way. The race was won by Kris Swanson in 13:29, his second consecutive victory at Bear Mountain. Nick was second in 14:02 and Ben claimed 3rd, top junior, in 14:56. Gary set a M50 course record of 15:59; he was 9th overall of the 94 finishers, down 8 from last year. Lawrence set a M60 course record of 19:07, he was 18th overall. The top female was Kerry Spearing in 16:42.

February 12, 2008
34 Harriers Award Winners
Gunner Shaw Most Valuable Runner - Steve Osaduik, Shane Ruljancich, Cheryl Murphy, Lucy Smith. Robin Pearson Most Improved Runner - Dee Ogden, Chris Callendar, Garth Campbell, Paul Christopher. Alex Marshall Master of the Year - Dee Ogden, Gary Duncan, Bruce Deacon. Maurice Tarrant/Rosamund Dashwood Veteran of the Year - John Woodall, Brian Connon, Maree Kennell, Sandy Anderson. Ken Smythe Dedicated Performance Award - Randy Jones. John Thipthorpe Durability Award - Gary Duncan. Susan Reid Most Consistent Harrier - Wendy Davies, Elaine Galbraith. Stewart Fall Junior of the Year - Ben Kingstone, Brandon Willson, Austin Willson, Kaitlyn van der Werff. Bob Reid Bright Shining Light Award - Joanne Rosen, Ming Kang, Craig Payne. Volunteer of the Year - Mike Emerson, Garfield Saunders, Gerry Etcheverry, Ken Smythe, Sylvan Smyth. Courage to Comeback Award - Charlie Ireland. Sponsor of the Year - Island Runner, Phil Nicholls. Prairie Inn Harriers Lifetime Membership - Maurice Tarrant.

February 10, 2008
Ian Hallam, Cheryl Murphy, Nick Best and Brian Connon
Ian won his first-ever Island Series race in 23 attempts with a thrilling finish today at the Cedar 12K, Race #3 in the Frontrunners Series. He edged Stefan Jacobsen 40:06 to 40:09 and outkicked Stefan to take the lead with 20 metres remaining. Harriers Nick Walker took third in 40:27. Cheryl made it three-for-three in winning Cedar in 42:38; she was 12th overall of the 381 finishers and almost secured her third consecutive Island Series Championship. Nick achieved his highest placing ever, 5th overall and 1st in the M20 division with a time of 41:46. He was awarded some Bob's Bonus Buds for his effort. Brian set a new Cedar 12K course record of 46:54 to win his third consecutive M60 title in three Series races to date. He was 31st overall at Cedar.

February 10, 2008
Bruce Deacon, Joan McGrath and Kirsty Smith
Bruce and Joan were top masters and Kirsty won the women's race at First Half Half Marathon in Vancouver today. Bruce set a new masters' course record of 1:09:12 to place fourth overall of the 2,016 finishers. Second place master was Anthony Skuce, 18th overall, in 1:14:45. Joan topped the F45 division in 1:23:09 to win her age division by a staggering 7 minutes and 15 seconds. She was almost 6 minutes ahead of the top F40 female, Jillian Fong. Ryan Hayden won the race for his second consecutive year in 1:06:02, 1 minute and 15 seconds shy of his 2007 course record of 1:04:47. Charles Bedley, of Toronto, took 2nd in 1:07:51 and Steve Osaduik was 3rd in 1:08:30. Harriers Kirsty Smith was the first female home in 1:16:43, more than 2 minutes clear of Calgary's Lisa Harvey, who finished 2nd in 1:19:02. Third place went to Lindsay McLaren, also of Calgary, in 1:20:18. A former guest speaker at RVM, Dick Beardsley of Austin, TX, placed 43rd overall in 1:20:50 to claim 2nd in the F50 division. Beardsley, 2:08:53, placed 2nd overall a mere 2 seconds behind Alberto Salazar, 2:08:51, in the 1982 Boston Marathon, an event that Harriers Tom Howard, Alex Marshall, Mike Ellis, Stu Fall, Chris Garrett-Petts, Bob Cook and Bob Reid all finished in under 3 hours.

February 3, 2008
Eil Manning
Superbowl MVP, Manning, led his underdog New York Giants to an exciting 17-14 upset victory over New England Patriots today. I watched the game in a boisterous jam-packed Sports Bar in Playa Carmen, Costa Rica.

January 27, 2008
Steve Osaduik and Cheryl Murphy
Steve, 31:11, and Cheryl, 34:44, took victories at the inaugural Cobble Hill 10K today. The conditions were fairly good at VIRA Series Race #2; it was sunny but cold and about 2 degrees. There was little frost was on the road about the 2K mark where runners did an out and back portion, but for the most part the footing was good an all runners liked the new course. It was nice to see Steve regaining his form and taking a big jump in Cobble Hill points (871) over Pioneer (842) two weeks ago. He is coming back into racing shape after a knee injury sidelined him for December and is on target for a great National Capital Marathon in Ottawa in May. Todd Howard led for the first half of the race and he and Steve ran together until about 8K where Steve pulled ahead to win by 11 seconds. Todd will be running the AT&T Austin Marathon in Texas next month as part of Team Canada. Cheryl had another stellar race collecting more points (884) than all the men, and beating Lucy Smith’s F35 course record, set at Mill Bay, by 2 seconds. Cheryl also collected more points than all the men at Pioneer with an 8K P.B. and a career high of 891 points. There were 524 registrations and 453 finishers at Cobble Hill, 72 of which were Harriers. Two hours after the race, heavy snow started falling about Goldstream Park and the cars were grid-locked into Victoria. It took 2 hours to travel 8 kilometres from Thetis Lake Park to Wal-Mart at Douglas Street and Saanich Road.

January 27, 2008
Nick Best, Julie van Veelen and Marcia Stromsmoe
Nick, Julie and Marcia had outstanding performances in their respective age categories at Cobble Hill 10K today, Race #2 of the Frontrunners Island Series. This new Cobble Hill venue replaced Mill Bay 10K, a race that moved from Cherry Point to Mill Bay on February 7, 1988 and remained there for 20 years. The Cherry Point event ran for 5 years from 1983 to 1987. Nick placed 7th overall at Cobble Hill, 1st in the M20 division in 34:25. Julie was 99th of 453 finishers to win the F30 age division in 42:32 and Marcia had an amazing finish to edge out Jackie Eddy by one half of one second. Both Marcia and Jackie were timed in 46:33.

January 27, 2008
Nancy Tinari
Nancy was the top age-graded runner at the Steveston Icebreaker 8K today, Race #1 of the Timex Lower Mainland Series. She finished in 30:23, 49th overall of the 284 finishers, and achieved an age-grated rating of 87.1% to win the F45 division. Nancy was top master and 5th female overall. Second place master was Rebecca Reid in 32:59 and Susan Reynolds was 3rd in 33:21. The race was won by Graeme Wells, of Surrey, in 24:39 and the top female was Richmond's Rachel Ruus in 29:25. Graeme achieved 86.4% while Rachel achieved 80.4% on the age-graded scale.

January 26, 2008
Lucy Smith, Bruce Deacon and Eric Kiauka
Lucy and Bruce were named BCA Master Road Runners of the Year for 2007 and Eric was named Senior Cross Country Runner of the year at the BC Athletics Awards Banquet tonight. The sold-out function was part of the BCA Annual General Meeting weekend festivities in Richmond. Bruce and Lucy excelled in a variety of 2007 races including exceptional performances and top master honours at the Sun Run, TC10K, Royal Victoria Half Marathon and New York City Marathon. Eric ran solid efforts at the Provincial Cross Country Championships in Victoria and the National Cross Country Championships in Guelph, Ontario.

January 20, 2008
Todd Howard and Suzanne Evans
Second place 2003 RVM finisher, Todd Howard, and three-time RVM Champion Suzanne Evans were recently named to represent Team Canada at the AT&T Austin Marathon on February 17. They will join team mates Nicole Stevenson and Peter Vail to compete against teams from USA, Kenya, Great Britain and Mexico in a unique team challenge where the top two men's and women's times will be added together to rank the teams for each of the 5 countries. Over $50,000 in prize money is available for individuals and teams.

January 13, 2008
Todd Howard, Cheryl Murphy, Bruce Deacon, Lucy Smith, Jeff Phillips and Kyla Coates
Todd and Cheryl were the top open runners and overall race winners, Bruce and Lucy were top masters and and Jeff and Kyla took junior victories and collected top prize money at 29th annual Prairie Inn Pioneer 8K race today. A total purse of $1,500 was available in prize money this year and it will be increased to $5,000 in 2009 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the event. Todd's winning time was 24:39, narrowly edging team mate, Jim Finlayson, by one second. Harriers' Scott Simpson took third in 24:56 as PIH swept 8 of the top 10 runners. Cheryl won the women's race in 27:18, a P.R., while Lucy took second in 28:03 and Harriers Kerry Spearing placed third in 29:24. Bruce finished fourth overall with a great master's time of 25:18. Jeff finished in 27:30 while Kyla hit the line in 30:43 to edge her twin sister, Alexa, by one second. There were 529 finishers at Pioneer, up 35 runners from last year's total of 494. It is hoped that the 2009 race will attract 1,000 finishers.

January 13, 2008
Simon Pearson, Julie van Veelen, Paul Christopher and Ming Kang
Simon, Julie, Paul and Ming accomplished huge P.R.s at the Prairie Inn Pioneer 8K today. Simon improved his 2007 time from 35:49 to 30:04 in 2008 and moved from 14th of 16 in his M30 age class to 9th of 25. His points bumped from 598 to 713, an enormous move forward of 115. Julie bounced from 37:57 last year to 33:25 this year to improve by over 4 minutes from 7th of 23 in the F30 division to 2nd of 16. Paul jumped from 585 points to 621, his highest-ever accomplishment, and improved his 2007 time of 36:39 to a nice 34:32 in 2008. He moved from 13th of 37 in his age category to 5th of 27 in the M55 division. Ming rose up to 29:11 in 2008 compared to 31:49 last year. He upped his age class peformance from 14th of 25 to 8th of 19.

January 12, 2008
Jon Brown
Jon raced to a seventh place performance at the PWN Half Marathon in the Netherlands today against an elite field of top-level runners. The race was won by Mulugeta Wami, of Ethiopia, in 1:04:33, followed by Morocco's Adil Annani in 1:04:47 and Michel Butter, from Holland, in 1:04:49. Jon's time was 1:06:16. The remaining field of top-10 finishers were all Kenyans, Moroccans or Ethiopians. The race course was quite bizarre with runners covering long stretches of sand along the ocean, then up some steep sand dune hills to a gravel pathway and finishing on paved paths and roadways through a maze of tightly parked cars. It hardly resembled a world-class race course, but certainly attracted world-class athletes with a big prize money purse. In a unique start, the women's elite field was sent off several minutes ahead of the men's elite field, probably the stagger being the difference between the men's and women's half marathon world records. There was a large bonus should the first male catch the leading female before the finish line. Wami just reeled in the top lady with about 50 metres to go. Jon is coming back nicely into racing form where he hopes to qualify for the Canadian Olympic Team for the Beijing Marathon in August. He will attempt to run under the 2:12 (ridiculous) Canadian qualifying standard next month at the Tokyo Marathon. The IAAF standard for all other countries is 2:15. We wish him the best of luck!

January 1, 2008
Daphne Panter, Bill and Bindi Scriven
75 PIH friends and family attended the 12th annual Harriers' Memorial Run at Elk/Beaver Lake today. Bill and Bindi Scriven were the closest to 0:00 at the predicted time run; Bill was 3 seconds before and Norm Reynolds was just ahead of him. Daphne Panter came in with a friend 50 seconds after 0:00 and they were the first females. Other runners were just "too fast" to win the coveted fruit platter or cheese platter. Over $1000 was donated to Harriers' Foundation Projects. Today's run was kicked off with some inspirational words remembering those who had passed away this year: Rosamund Dashwood, Jytte Haagensen, Pepsi and Petra, and a recommendation to do something in 2008 that you had been putting off in 2007. Many thanks to the Cocoa Crew of Ken Smythe and Karen Hughes. To date over $178,000 has been donated to the Harriers Foundation from this event and the Gunner Shaw Cross Country race in November.