2023 Sprint Duathlon Ontario Provincial Champs

"We did it baby"

August 13, 2023 in Barrie Ontario had been marked on my calendar for a while. Especially since a year prior in the provincial champs I dealt with a double flat front tire and had to walk a few kilometres on the way back to the race site before being picked up from an official.

2023 had already been filled with many race related downs. First in April I wasn’t able to race in the World Champs in Spain due to a back injury (spondylolisthesis, essentially arthritis from my understanding) and second lost my first 2 races back, finishing second to the same person in each.

Going into Barrie I had many thoughts covering all corners of my brain. I had the Khamzat Chimaev side here, I had the “I can’t make up that much time on him” side, “the injury set me back too far” side, the “get prepared for next year”, the “get ready to see God” side, the serious side, the playful side. I ran through all potential race situations, many more unfavourable than favourable ones. In the end, the race played out exactly how I envisioned, except the me falling apart part and others beating me didn’t happen. Here is the low down.

I wasn't expecting much as far as an outcome, and that may have been beneficial. I felt loose and relaxed. The 5k run started, I co-lead the first k in 3:36. Around that time I wanted to conserve for a solid 20k bike and a better 2.5k to finish. I slowed down a touch and 2 competitors came around me and probably held that same pace as the first k, as me and another held 3:41 for the next 2k. We let them get around a 10 second gap on us, and I wanted to keep that around the same so when we got into transition for the bike I could come out on the bike in first and hold anyones wheel who may pass. As we held them to about 8-10sec ahead, we went 3:48 and 3:44 in kms 4 and 5. I got into transition in 3rd, and I believe now I came out in first, yet I didn’t know it at the time. Between the triathlon and duathlon there were approx 650 blending into the same course.

The bike course was 4, 5km loops along the lakeshore. I wanted to hold 270 watts as I thought that would have me equal to anyone else on the day. In the end I came out with the fastest bike split of the day in all races held, by 9 seconds (a triathlete), but by 2:06 in the duathlon. This had me in first but I still wasn’t entirely sure I was in the lead until approx 1.3k in to the 2.5k run to finish. Only then when I saw the other top competitors I knew I had it.

Before that though, as I started the final 2.5k run both of my calves cramped up, but seeing all my pals from church cheering me on left me with more motivation and I was able to run it off in 150 meters or so. I had told people I wanted to ‘see God’ during this race- a term synonymous with going all out, akin to being at the bottom of the well. I was just running as hard as I could still unsure of my placing, dumping water onto my face for cooling, while maybe getting a bit of the residual splash in my mouth, along with the sweat. As I turned around at the halfway point then I could see each competitor I thought that may be ahead of me, in fact behind, still making their way out to that point. They were all within a minute or less of each other. The other oddity is that the race went off in waves of 35 people, so even when I saw them, I wasn’t sure if people from other waves would have a better time, so I just kept hammering. In the end, I won by 2 and a half minutes, face down in the grass trying to breathe, and finding my girlfriend to tell her “we did it”. I was thrilled I could bring myself to perform at my best level, regardless of competition.

5km run, 20km bike, 2.5km run, all in 58 minutes flat. As much as I enjoyed that day and celebrating with my friends, my mind always shifts to what is next. First, my plan is to go back to Montreal for Nationals and repeat as National Champion. The greater plan is thinking about how to shave off another 3 minutes to become competitive on the world stage. 55 minutes would see me in the top 10 in my age group in the world. I have no endurance talent, coming 210th out of 262 in my high school cross country meet, but with some consistent effort, I plan to keep making up ground on the best.

LFG