© Copyright – 2019 – Athletics Illustrated

Gabriela DeBues-Stafford’s battled hard on the track during 2019, taking five national records a total of seven times. The one that the Canadian Sports Awards are recognizing is where she ran under four-minutes in the metric mile. She is the first Canadian to run under the benchmark in the 1500-metre distance.

In so doing she took town the national 1500m record twice, first, taking Lynn Kanuka’s record of 4:00.27, from Brussels Diamond League in 1985 with a 4:00.26 at the same meet, then she bettered four-minutes with a 3:59.59 in the Zurich Diamond League meet in August.

It’s a stunning achievement, but she is up against several other excellent performances including the one by Bianca Andreescu who took down Serena Williams in the U.S. Open in straight sets. Perhaps both performances are harbingers of great things to come.

While Andreescu takes a little break from the WTA tour, DeBues-Stafford is getting ready for the 2019 IAAF Doha World Athletics Championships starting Sept. 27.

Voting for the award takes place here:

https://www.cbc.ca/sports/performance-year-canadian-sport-1.5279907