The 2024 version of Survivorfest, a fixed-time race hung on a 400m monitor at Edmonton’s Strathcona Athletic Park, as soon as once more noticed a few of Canada’s most sensible ultrarunners functioning at their highest, this time amid some wild climate. Exshaw, Alta.’s Wayne Gaudet, 67, controlled a forged sweep of the Canadian males’s 65-70 class and captured 4 data in overall (pending ratification through the ACU): the 100K (10 hours, 35 mins, 57 seconds), 12-hour (111 km), 100-mile (17 hours, 44 mins) and 24-hour data (202.892 km).
A past due bloomer
Gaudet, who used to be born in Victoria, advised Canadian Working he wasn’t all the time a runner.”I had a sofa potato level in my 20s and a biking segment in my 30s,” he explains.”I began operating when I used to be about 40, as I simply couldn’t to find the massive time slots wanted for my motorcycle.” Whilst Gaudet to begin with struggled to run across the block, a pal challenged him to run the 1997 Victoria Marathon. “I assumed it went lovely smartly and that used to be that,” he says, however he used to be a ways from completed.
“There used to be one fellow there who used to be operating his twenty fifth marathon, and I imagined he used to be a little daffy and couldn’t fathom that might ever be me,” Gaudet says. “However by some means, one marathon ended in some other, which ended in ultramarathons, which ended in trails, and in the end an be offering of a place to run one thing known as a 24-hour race.”
Gaudet finished his first 24-hour tournament representing Workforce Canada on the 2011 Commonwealth Championship in Llandudno, Wales. “I by some means controlled to guide the Canadian staff in mileage that 12 months, so I used to be requested to the International Championships in Katowice, Poland in September 2012, and I assume I simply by no means stopped.”
Gaudet to begin with competed at Survivorfest in 2021, and has returned once a year, this time with the hopes of breaking the 24-hour males’s 65-70 file. As he hit the 100-mile mark, Gaudet says he used to be astonished to be told he had damaged a file; two hours later he used to be shocked once more when he surpassed the former 12-hour mileage. After taking pictures the 100-mile and 24-hour data, Gaudet started to fight with a critical lean to the left, making operating in a directly line difficult.”I controlled 202 km and used to be thankful for a way my frame carried out for the general 5 hours,” he says.
Alberta lady plans to run 50 ultramarathons, raises budget for sexual attack improve centre
Document effects at 2024 Survivorfest
The primary version of Survivorfest, dubbed “a birthday celebration of energy, sacrifice and survival” kicked off in Edmonton in 2018. The race raises budget for Saffron Centre, a non-profit group based totally in Sherwood Park, Alta., that helps the ones suffering from sexual violence; race director Laura Sherrer-Townsend says that her dedication to fighting sexual violence is the principle reason why she began Survivorfest Working Tournament in 2018.
Since Survivorfest started, it’s been a qualifier for athletes short of a place on the World Affiliation of Ultrarunners (IAU) International Championships, and incessantly hosts probably the most maximum completed ultrarunners from throughout Canada.
“This 12 months’s race shall be identified for the elements, evidently,” Sherrer-Townsend advised Canadian Working, explaining that Saturday’s climate integrated rain, wind or even some hail. “Fortunately, Sunday we had been rewarded with a ravishing break of day, and less rain and chilly–a natural instance of why athletes wish to teach in each and every situation and get ready themselves for no matter their race day will convey,” she added.
Together with the M65 data damaged through Gaudet, the development noticed Carla Rodriguez Dimitrescu breaking the ladies’s 12-hour Mexican file. (In 2023, Dimitrescu additionally set a brand new ladies’s 6-hour Mexican file in 2023, with 66.268 km.) 4 Canadian athletes additionally certified for the 2024 Canadian 24-hour staff: Gaudet, Etienne Durocher, Mallory Rhicard and Adela Salt (a brand new Canadian, as of April 18).
As for Gaudet: he is also hitting the monitor once more subsequent 12 months. “I assumed I would possibly retire, however now I’m considering I will do higher, and heck, I will run 100K sooner than 10:35!” he says. “So, unsure but, however I most probably shall be at Survivorfest 2025.”