When Sam Lazar crossed the finish line in the Prince George Citizen Triathlon, he had no idea he had just won the Olympic distance race. He was given that welcome piece of news a few minutes later, while he was cooling down.
The 36-year-old teacher from Vanderhoof was stunned.
"I'm extremely surprised -- I don't usually win these things," said Lazar, who finished a 1.5-kilometre swim, 20km bike ride and 10km run in a time of two hours 24 minutes 19 seconds. "I've been training a lot harder this year and I guess hard work pays off."
The race was held Sunday at West Lake Provincial Park. It was the "sixth or seventh" triathlon of Lazar's career, his first in Prince George, and marked his first-ever victory. And he won by a substantial margin. The next-closest competitors were P.G. athletes Rod Lecher (2:25:46) and Michael Buchanan (2:26:53).
Lazar, a former 10km and marathon runner who would mix in a little swimming as cross-training, started doing triathlons two years ago because he was looking for a new challenge. On Sunday, he said the toughest part of his race was the swim in the choppy West Lake waters.
"It was pretty wavy and you had to try and time your breaths so you would breathe at the crest of a wave, otherwise you'd get a face full of water when you'd try and breathe," he said. "That was pretty gross."
Lazar was the fifth Olympic distance male to reach the beach. On the bike portion, held along Blackwater Road, he passed everyone but Lecher. When Lazar ditched his wheels in favour of running shoes, he pounded along West Lake Road and got himself to the front of the pack.
"Going up those hills, I ran with my eyes closed for a fair bit, just concentrating and pushing," he said with a chuckle.
Lazar, a French Immersion instructor at Vanderhoof's W.L. McLeod elementary, will next tackle the Canadian age group national championships, Aug. 21 in Kelowna. A top-10 finish there would qualify him for worlds next year in Auckland, New Zealand.
In the women's category, Sonya Croker was Sunday's Olympic distance champion. Croker, who recently moved from London, Ont., to work as a geologist at Endako Mine near Fraser Lake, finished her race in a time of 2:36:37. She crossed the line ahead of Darcy Russell (2:43:57) and Lorelei St. Rose (2:44:58), both from Prince George.
Croker, like Lazar, was a first-time entrant and winner in the Citizen triathlon. Earlier this season, the 25-year-old also won triathlon and half-marathon events in Smithers so she's having a great year so far.
On Sunday, churning water and headwinds gave her some momentary struggles on the swim and bike segments respectively but she persevered.
"I panicked a little bit at the start of the swim -- the waves were pretty choppy and I sucked back a lot of water," Croker said. "The swim was alright after I got past the first buoy and then the bike, the wind was pretty horrendous going out. It was uphill and against the wind. Coming back was great because you had a tail wind the whole way."
For Croker, the run was basically problem-free. She especially enjoyed the closing moments.
"Coming in is really nice because the wind is behind you and you're going downhill right to the finish," she said.
Croker, a former track and field athlete at the University of Western Ontario, has kicked her triathlon training up a few notches this season because she's preparing for her first appearance in the Subaru Ironman Canada, Aug. 28 in Penticton. In that torturing test of endurance, she'll have to swim 3.8km, cycle 180km and run 42.2km. A sub-12-hour time is her goal.
"I'm scared," she said with a laugh. "I'm really scared. I don't even know how it's going to go."
Sunday's race also featured a sprint distance triathlon and a duathlon.
See Tuesday's Citizen for more coverage.
