Air North’s charter flight from Victoria, BC, touched down in Whitehorse with lots of tired legs on board Monday. Though not on the cargo manifest, there were also numerous top-10 finishes from the Victoria Marathon on Sunday.
Whitehorse’s Logan Roots had one such result. Roots finished 18th out of 5,147 runners in the half marathon distance at one hour, 17 minutes and 46 seconds.
His time put him in first for males under 19, 22 spots up from the next in his age division. (Roots, who has represented the Yukon at two major Games in athletics, could not be reached for comment.)
The next Yukoner over the line was Simon Lapointe at 1:20:50, coming 41st overall and fifth for males 35-39.
Following Lapointe was first-time competitor in Victoria Tom Ullyett, finishing 109th overall and seventh for males 50-54.
Ullyett set his personal best time of 1:26:46 for the distance, “which goes to prove that running at sea-level is always an advantage, opposed to running at 2,000 feet in Whitehorse,” said Ullyett. “I did a 1:28 two years ago at the World Masters Games and last October I did a 1:27 at Valley Harvest Marathon in Nova Scotia.
“This year I was able to back it up a little bit more to 1:26, so I’m very pleased with that.”
Despite running with a foot injury, Keith Thaxter was the fastest Yukoner in the marathon with a time of 3:07:47, putting him in 86th overall and ninth for males 45-49.
“I injured my foot in June; I thought I had broken or fractured my foot,” said Thaxter. “So I’ve kind of been on the mend - I wasn’t even sure I could run the (Klondike Trail of ‘98) road relay.”
Thaxter estimates that Sunday’s marathon was his 76th so far; he set his personal best time last year in Victoria at 2:57:52.
“I still had a respectable time, but I was hoping to do a little faster,” said Thaxter. “The first part was good, but the second part I slowed down and my foot was a little sore.”
Twenty spots back from Thaxter in 106th - 27th for his age category - was Whitehorse’s Sheldon Lyslo at 3:10:40. Finishing in 202nd was Whitehorse’s Yanik Freeman, also coming 39th for males 36-39.
Age categories aside, Whitehorse’s Bonnie Love was out in front for walkers, finishing first overall in the half marathon at 2:22:14. Not far behind was Tanya Astika, Yukon’s second walker in, at 2:33:17. Love and Astika were both on Whitehorse’s Chocolate Claim Walkers team that won the walking division at the Klondike Trail of ‘98 Road Relay for the third straight year last month.
This year’s Victoria Marathon had more than 12,000 participants, including over 60 Yukoners, most of whom took the Air North charter.
“The charter flight makes it dead easy,” said Ullyett. “It’s so well done by Air North, you don’t even have to think twice about going. It just makes it so simple.”
Contact Tom Patrick at
tomp@yukon-news.com