We’re simply 4 days away from the tip of the Paris Olympic marathon qualification window, and as issues stand, Canada will possible be sending a small staff of three marathon runners to the French capital this August. (The utmost is six–three ladies and three males; Crew Canada despatched a full staff of six to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics for the marathon.)
Who’s in?
Cam Levins and Rory Linkletter have secured their spots on the lads’s staff, having run beneath the lads’s normal of two:08:10, whereas Malindi Elmore will signify Canada as the only feminine marathoner in Paris, assembly the usual eventually yr’s Berlin Marathon, the place she ran 2:23:30 (the usual is 2:26:50).
Who’s now out?
Over the weekend on the Hamburg Marathon in Germany, 4 Canadians tried the respective males’s and girls’s requirements, however all fell quick. Natasha Wodak, Leslie Sexton and Dayna Pidhoresky all missed the ladies’s normal of two:26:50, with Wodak ending 4 minutes shy, on account of stomach cramps. Pidhoresky and Sexton didn’t end, dropping out round midway.
2020 Olympic marathoner Ben Preisner of Milton, Ont., withdrew from the race early, feeling that he wouldn’t have the ability to attain the usual. As an alternative of giving up on his Paris Olympic desires and flying again to Canada, the 28-year-old selected to remain in Europe to compete in Sunday’s last-chance qualifying race, the Copenhagen Marathon. “I have to see this Olympic qualification course of by means of to the bitter finish,” Preisner wrote on Instagram. “Six days to now put together my physique the most effective I can.”
One final likelihood
Preisner got here near assembly the usual earlier this yr in Japan, when he ran a private greatest of two:08:58–48 seconds off the usual–to position fourth on the Beppu-Ōita Marathon (the fourth-fastest males’s marathon time in Canadian historical past). This consequence put him in rivalry for doable Olympic choice primarily based on World Athletics rating factors. However as extra male marathoners world wide hit the two:08:10 mark, Preisner’s place within the rankings fell.
In keeping with the World Athletics Street to Paris software, of the 80 allotted spots within the marathon, 70 males have met the Olympic normal. If there are not any scratches or accidents throughout the discipline of 70, 10 spots can be out there for male runners to qualify primarily based on factors. If Preisner runs the usual Sunday, he’s assured entry–however technically, he might get in even when he doesn’t run fairly that quick. Since he earned 1,177 factors along with his earlier marathon in Beppu-Ōita, he would wish to earn the same variety of World Athletics factors to get in—complicated? I do know.
Let’s dive in. What works in Preisner’s favour with Sunday’s Copenhagen Marathon is that it’s a World Athletics Elite Label race, that means performances listed here are value extra, because of the depth of discipline and competitors. To summarize, an excellent efficiency on the Copenhagen Marathon is value greater than an excellent efficiency in Beppu-Ōita, which suggests Preisner has some room to work with—roughly two hours, 9 minutes and 45 seconds. If he can end beneath 2:09:45, he’ll possible qualify for the Olympic marathon on factors.
Preisner isn’t the one Canadian male marathoner searching for a last-minute spot. The 2023 Canadian Marathon champion, Thomas Broatch, can be making his third look on the distance, coming off a four-minute private greatest efficiency on the 2024 Houston Marathon, the place he positioned seventh in 2:11:51. Though Broatch’s time is much from the lads’s Olympic normal, if he can run a close to three-minute private greatest, he might additionally put himself in rivalry by way of factors.
The ultimate Canadian within the Copenhagen discipline is Lee Wesselius, the highest finisher on the 2023 Ottawa Marathon. For Wesselius to qualify, he would wish to fulfill the two:08:10 normal and never a second quick. His private greatest of two:14:39 is from the McKirdy Micro Marathon final November.
You may observe the outcomes of the 2024 Copenhagen Marathon from Denmark reside on Sunday at 3:30 a.m. ET, right here.
