Past winner looks to improve performance
‘I’m in much better shape now,’ says Vancouver’s Cliff
On April 23, Rachel Cliff will participate in the Vancouver Sun Run for the second time.
The first time — Cliff’s first serious 10K race, in 2014 — ended great. She won, completing the course in 33 minutes and 14 seconds.
This year, Cliff says matter-offactly, she hopes to do even better.
“I hope to improve on how I ran in 2014,” says the 29-year-old elite runner, who grew up in Vancouver and attended the University of Guelph before returning to Vancouver to complete a master’s degree at the University of B.C. “I’m in much better shape now, so hopefully I will run much better.”
Typically, there are between 25 and 30 elite runners, as well as several elite wheelchair racers, participating in the Vancouver Sun Run. They include many international runners from such countries as Kenya and Jamaica who come to Canada to train — and, of course, take in the Sun Run.
Other local elite runners participating in the 2017 Sun Run include Neasa Coll and Declan White.
Coll has made big improvements over the last couple of years, running 2:41:06 for fourth place at the Canadian Marathon Championships in Toronto last October and placing third last month at the Around the Bay 30K in Hamilton — Canada’s oldest road race.
On the men’s side, Declan White, who is at Trinity Western University, placed second at the Canadian Universities Cross Country Championship last November. He also came in fifth at the Sun Run in 2015.
“I’m a 5k/10k specialist,” says Cliff of the Sun Run. “And I’ve done half marathons before. For me, I love that distance. It’s a nice mixture of speediness and competitiveness. And it’s over somewhat quickly. It’s a fun run for me.”
Cliff, who has ambitions to represent Canada at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, trains with the B.C. Endurance Project under coach Richard Lee, who has guided four other athletes to the Olympics, including two last year.
She recently ran her first serious half marathon at the United Airlines New York City Half Marathon, placing eighth in 1:12:07 against an international field, just beating Caroline Rotich, the 2015 Boston Marathon winner.
Last September, she married Olympian Chris Winter. He has retired from serious competition, but helps pace his wife in workouts.
Cliff said growing up in Vancouver she had always heard of the Sun Run, so wanted to participate.
“It’s really special. The event organizers do a great job and the whole city gets into it. So it’s exciting to line up against the whole city.”
She mostly runs on the Stanley Park trails or at Pacific Spirit Park at the University of B.C.
“It (the Sun Run route) is very pretty. It starts fast down Georgia and the people cheering always makes it fun. And Vancouver’s such a gorgeous city. Unless it’s raining, it (the Sun Run) will be spectacular. If it’s raining, it will be different.”