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Dayna Pidhoresky of Vancouver and Reid Coolsaet of Guelph were the top Canadians at the Tamarak Ottawa Marathon on Sunday.
Thirty-nine-year-old Coolsaet, one of Canada’s all-time fastest at the 42.195K distance, finished the race in eighth place and in the time of 2:17:36 – 7:08 off of his personal best of 2:10:28.
He battled rising temperatures and headwinds and lost his pacer earlier than expected.
A top-five placing or a sub-2:11:30 performance would have given him the likelihood of nomination to the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. He has run well in Toronto, perhaps October awaits Coolseat.
Albert Korir won the race in 2:08:02. The Kenyan finished 11 and 49 seconds in front of Ethiopians Abera Kuma and Tsedat Ayana.
Alister Gardner of Bromont, QC finished as second Canadian and 18th overall in the time of 2:31:50. Francois Landry of Sherbrooke, QC was third and the first master in 2:36:50.
Dayna Pidhoresky missed a couple of big goals too, but put up a very good performance finishing in 2:37:18, as first Canadian and sixth female overall. She, like Coolsaet, may want to look for a fall marathon if she wants to continue to pursue getting on the 2020 Tokyo Olympic team.
Two years ago, she ran her personal best in Ottawa in the time of 2:36:08. She would need to otherwise run under 2:29:30 while being a top-three Canadian.
Currently, only one Canadian woman has run fast enough during the qualification period, Vancouver’s Rachel Cliff, who owns the national record of 2:26:53.
For the men, there are currently no qualifiers, however, Black Creek, BC native Cam Levins in October took down the 43-year-old national record with his running at the Toronto Marathon crossing the finish line in 2:09:25. He may also seek to run a fall marathon – it could be an exciting season for Canadian marathon running.
Qualification started January 1, 2019 and ends May 29, 2020.
A total of 2,696 people participated in the marathon, while 3,519 took in the weekend events which included a 2K, 5K, 10K and 21.1K half-marathon.
Results are available here>>
