It was a cool, cloudy morning as 109 runners took to the trails Sunday for the Prince George Mad Moose Marathon.
Ian McIlvenna of Quesnel surprised everyone when he came down the muddy path at the Otway Ski Centre to cross the finish line with a 3:19:56 (hour, minute, second) time, winning the men's full marathon.
"I was fit and healthy enough to come and make a show for it," said McIlvenna. "It turned out OK."
Being number one is a rare experience for McIlvenna.
"I'm actually the fourth best runner in the immediate family after my wife, my two kids and, actually, my dog runs better than me," he laughed. "This is a big thing for me."
The 41-year-old said he's battled numerous running-related injuries this year - the latest forced him to pull out of a 100-mile run in Washington State last weekend after about one-fifth of the race.
"Nothing has been going too well this year with injuries, this is the first actual success I've had," he said.
McIlvenna edged out Prince George's John Hagen (3:22:57) - slightly dismayed he didn't crack the 3:20 mark - but still better from Hagen's second-place finish of 3:25:45 last year.
The times were no where close to the course record of 3:12:51, set in 2010 by Kevin Grigg - who took the year off, but showed up to cheer on the runners.
For the second straight year, Reid Roberts placed third in the 42-kilometre distance, coming in two minutes ahead of his 2010 pace at 3:31:00.
Roberts, a physical education teacher at D.P. Todd, said he was happy to see one of his students, Luke Veeken, attempt the full marathon for the first time. Roberts said when he passed the 16 year old, the teenager was keeping pace with the frontrunners in the women's full marathon.
"I cramped up and I couldn't keep up to them anymore," said Veeken, who told his family his calfs started to bother him between UNBC and Cranbrook Hill. "It was way faster than I was training."
Veeken walked in longer intervals in the final half of the race, but managed to power through the pain in order to avoid being passed, finishing with a time of 4:22:14.
"It's hard, but I completed it," he said.
The cross-country runner at D.P. Todd said the trail was similar to his leg of the Death Race relay, which he completed in the summer with four friends.
"It's the exact same for my leg - no difference at all," said Veeken about the 19 kilometres he ran in 136 minutes in Grande Cache, Alta. "I [was] really happy with that I got 19th out of 300-and-something people."
