Who will prevail in 2016?
Art Meaney has his picks in: look for Colin Fewer and Kate Bazeley to recapture Tely titles
The men’s field for the 2016 Tely 10 will be one of the best ever, and the competition for a top 10 placing will be intense.
At the forefront will be three men with the credentials to pull off a victory. Colin Fewer has won eight Telys, and wants to tie the record nine wins held by the legendary Pat Kelly.
Ontario native Matt Loiselle won the Tely in 2012 and 2015 and would love to do it again. Ryan Brockerville, who spends most of his time in British Columbia, has road racing victories in that province and locally in the past few years.
Is this the year Brockerville will join the long list of Tely champions stretching back to 1922?
After a lot of thought, I have decided to pick Fewer for the win.
I do so based on his recent performances — a good effort at the Vancouver Sun Run in April, finishing ahead of Loiselle at the Toronto Waterfront 10Km in June and winning performances at the local Harbourfront 10K and Mews 8K races.
Loiselle has been battling injuries recently, and may not be as race sharp as usual. I believe he will finish second.
Nevertheless, Loiselle is always a dangerous opponent and excels in longer races like the Tely. He has won twice before, and be assured he will run hard and fast on Sunday in pursuit of a third championship.
The Marystown-born Brockerville continues to improve. In April, he outraced Fewer at the Vancouver Sun Run en route to setting a personal best of 30:30 on the 10K course.
I see Brockerville finishing third behind the duo of Fewer and Loiselle.
The latter two have more experience and success at the 10-mile distance, but if Brockerville can summon a late surge Sunday, he could make it scary for the frontrunners.
Montreal native Graydon Snyder was runner-up to Loiselle at last year’s Tely in 51:04. Third in 2008, second in 2009, fourth in 2010 and third in 2012, he has become a fixture at the race.
Snyder is a scientist whose studies of running statistics have been widely published. I think his Tely experience will carry the running scientist to a fourth-place finish this year.
David Freake will round out the top five. He has a long list of local wins to his credit, and has run well in mainland races. He can run anything from the 5K to half marathon distance with strength and speed. He feels he has yet to run his best Tely, and during the last month has trained hard to make the 2016 race his best to date.
Memorial University crosscountry star Jordan Fewer is a last-minute entry in this year’s race. He is back in good form after nearly a year’s layoff because of injury. He waged an exciting battle with Freake last year, and came out on top.
But I think this year he will finish behind Freake, in sixth.
Mark Greene is a former Memorial cross-country runner whose infrequent racing leads to people underestimating him. He trains alone, hard and fast. A win at the USR 10K race in June and an impressive secondplace behind Colin Fewer at the recent Mews race has made it clear Greene has the right racing stuff. I pick him for seventh. Young Matt Power of Placentia is also a Memorial cross-country runner. I have coached him at the university and watched him develop into a fine athlete with the potential to be a future Tely champ. His third place in 26:26 at the Mews race was a major success, and should give him the confidence to tangle with the fast guys and finish eighth.
Veteran Peter Bazeley is a wily and successful road racer. Over the years, he has won frequently on the road race circuit, including the challenging Cape to Cabot Race in 2014. In his one appearance locally this year, he ran 34:04 for third at the Harbourfront Race. I think his experience and fitness will put him in the top ten again this year in ninth place.
This season has been a breakthrough year for Charlie Kourvelas. Three third-places in the local road race series has opened a lot of eyes to his talents. Last week, I watched him lead his Athletics Northeast teammates through a series of mile repeats on the Tely course. He looked ready for his best Tely yet.
Kourvelas in 10th.
In 2014, Kate Bazeley won the Tely 10 with the secondfastest women’s time ever on the course, 10 seconds slower than Nicola Will’s epic record of 55:47 in 1986.
Bazeley would dearly love to break Will’s 30-year-old record Sunday, and if the conditions are favorable, she may do it.
Record or not, Bazeley will be the 2016 Tely women’s champ.
2015 Tely winner Anne Johnston will be running this year’s race. One of the select group of women to run under 60 minutes on the historic route, she always comes ready to race and I believe will be runner up to Bazeley.
Caroline McIlroy, another past Tely winner, has won at distances from the half mile to the ultramarathon in her long and accomplished running career. In her 40s now, she still has that competitive fire that will enable a third-place finish this year.
Karen Stacey will be fourth. She too has won often locally and likes to run hard and fast from the gun. Last week, she did a workout on the Tely course with fast guys like Peter Power, Charlie Kourvelas and Mark Hayward. She looked ready for a strong Tely.
Jennifer Barron finished third at the Mews race and was second to Anne Johnston at the USR 10K event. Barron is one of a group of young female runners who have made quite an impact on the road race scene lately. I think Barron will run her best Tely to date and finish fifth.
I was very impressed by Katie Wadden’s performance at the Mews race last week. She was the fourth woman and ran 30:16 on the 8K course. That translates into a Tely time in the low 60-minute range, and it should be good enough for a sixthplace result. Jennifer Murrin won the USR Half Marathon in June and was four seconds behind Wadden at the recent Mews race. Afterwards, she told me she lost her focus late in the race and Wadden took advantage of her lapse. I am choosing Murrin for seventh, but one of the more interesting duels on Sunday could be between Wadden and Murrin.
Krissy Dooling has an accomplished running resume. A frequent road race winner during the last decade, last year she added a Cape to Cabot crown to her list of victories. Her experience and mental strength will take her to eighth.
Susan Martyn is one of the best veteran women runners in the province. She ran crosscountry at Memorial over 20 years ago and is still a force on the local scene. She will have a top ten finish in ninth place. Stephanie Nevin is another of the young female road racers worth noting. She likes the longer races and ten miles suits her abilities. I think she will round out the top ten women.
In case you think running is only a young person’s game, consider this: on Sunday, Chris Jermyn and Evan Simpson, both in their mid-70s, are aiming to break the amazing Fred Wight’s 75-79 age group record of 82:46. Florence Barron, 77, is hoping to break her own age group record of 89:56, and 81-year-old Fred Wight would like to break his own record of 95:59. Go for it folks. Art Meaney, the 1979 Tely 10 champion, has a record 19 top 10 finishes from 19772000, and has held five age group records. In 1911, his grandfather, Tom Meaney, won the New Waterford 5-Mile in Nova Scotia, a decade before the birth of the Tely 10. Art will run the 2016 Tely with his sons, Jim and Richard.