Steeplechaser Genevieve Lalonde will go from the track as a finalist in an eerily empty stadium last summer at the Tokyo Olympics to the roads of North Saanich this weekend. Natasha Wodak comes via the roads of Sapporo, where she contested the Olympic marathon.
Both are used to hurry-up-and-wait delays, with the Tokyo Games pushed back a year from when originally scheduled due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and the Harriers Pioneer 8K moved to Sunday at 11:30 a.m. after being postponed from January because of rare Lower Island snowy road conditions at the time.
Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020 Olympian Wodak is a seven-time women’s champion of the Harriers Pioneer 8K race and holds both the event records of 25:28 set in 2013 on the old Saanichton route and the current course record of 25:55 set in 2020. Victoria-based Lalonde made the Olympic 3,000-metre steeplechase final in Tokyo.
“Sunday will see a strong elite field,” said the race’s high- performance director, Bob Reid.
The Pioneer course is popular because it is considered one of the fastest in the province. It is a softly undulating rural out-and-back route starting and finishing at the Saanich Peninsula Chamber of Commerce and Visitor Information Centre located on the west side of the Pat Bay Highway in North Saanich.
Wodak, 10,000 metres gold medallist in the 2019 Lima Pan Am Games, and Lalonde head a strong women’s field that includes Lucy Smith, Jen Millar and Catrin Jones. The top men’s seeds are Thomas Broatch of Vancouver and Brendon Wong of Coquitlam.
Runners can register online until 6 p.m. tonight at islandseries.org. There is no race-day registration. Pioneer 8K race information is at pih.bc.ca/race/1-pioneer-8k.
The Island Race Series will conclude with the Comox Valley RV Half Marathon on March 13, Westcoast Sooke 10K on March 27 and the Synergy Health Management Bazan Bay 5K on April 10. The Cobble Hill 10K in January and Hatley Castle 8K this month — with Andrew Russell the top male in 26:46 and Natasha Parsons top female in 31:47 — opened the series.
The 2022 Island Race Series heralds the continuing return of live, in-person racing following the cancellation of the Series in 2021 due to the pandemic. It is part of the sa国际传媒 Athletics Super Series, with runners tabulating season points in races held on the Island and Lower Mainland.
