World-class runner won’t forget St. Catharines roots
Ahmed continues pursuit of chasing dreams that were forged in ‘our great city’
Mohammed Ahmed wasn’t at St. Catharines city hall Monday night to receive the city’s athlete of the year award for a record-tying third time.
After high-altitude training in the Colorado mountains, the 29-yearold distance runner was back at his training base in Oregon getting ready to compete for Canada at the Summer Olympics in Tokyo.
Ahmed apologized for his absence in a text to Alexander Acs, one of his high school coaches at St. Catharines Collegiate.
“It does not mean my mind and heart are not present with you. Being an athlete is no easy endeavour. It means being away from family and friends,” read Acs, who accepted the award on Ahmed’s behalf.
“It entails intense training. It requires not only the physical, but also plenty of mental fortitude.
“The challenge is to show up every day with our entire being despite the many hardships and life baggage we carry.”
Ahmed, the first Canadian to earn a medal in a distance event at the World Track and Field Championships, winning bronze in the men’s 5,000 metres, still considers St. Catharines home though he hasn’t lived here since going off to University of Wisconsin.
“Deep down, I’m still that kid who discovered he could run on the Twelve Mile Creek and Short Hills trails, and it is these dreams which I forged in our great city that I am still chasing today.” Ahmed wrote in his text to Acs. “In every endeavour, I undertake a goal to make St. Catharines and its people proud.
After thanking his parents and brothers for their “unconditional love and support,” Ahmed thanked Perry Wakulich and Acs, his high school coaches, and Niagara Olympic Club coaches Sharon Stewart and Stuart Galloway for giving him “invaluable advice, mentorship and friendship.”
He then thanked teammates he has had throughout his career for pushing him to “new territories of self-discovery.”
Ahmed, who also won the award in 2009 and 2016, joins wrestler Tonya Verbeek as the only threetime winner of an honour that has been bestowed on an annual basis since 1968.
Ahmed placed 18th in the 10,000 metres at his first Summer Olympics, 2012 in London. Four years later, in Rio de Janeiro, he finished fourth in the 5,000 and 32nd in the 10,000.
He won gold in the men’s 10,000 at the 2015 Pan Am Games, which were held in Toronto as well as centres in southern Ontario, including St. Catharines and Welland.
Athlete of the year was one of two prestigious community honours Monday night in council chambers. Doug Hamilton, 2021 Canada Summer Games chair, was honoured as sportsperson of the year.