---

THANK YOU so much for taking part in this year’s SudburyROCKS!!! COVID edition. We appreciate your support this year more than ever!

Race Prep Details: Please remember to document your race with a photo of your watch for verification on the leader’s dashboard. Upload your photos and tag SudburyROCKS!!! Marathon and the Northern Cancer Foundation on Facebook or Twitter. Please submit the photo of your Watch/Strava. Make sure to include your name as it appears in the registration and your time with distance ran/walked to etaillefer@hsnsudbury.ca no later than October 26. Please continue to collect pledges and if you are able, give a gift to support the Northern cancer Foundation and the work of our heroes at the Northeast Cancer Centre. https://www.events.runningroom.com/site/16618/sudburyrocks-marathon-2020-presented-by-ionic-engineering/?vrindex=8 Earlier this year we lost our co-founder Steve Matusch to liver cancer. His presence throughout the planning of this year’s Marathon has been greatly missed. Thank you for joining us as we #RunforSteve and honour his legacy. Stay well, SudburyROCKS!!! Marathon 2020 Race Committee www.sudburyrocksmarathon.com     REGISTER ONLINE TODAY! STILL OPEN UNTIL OCT 26

 

 

Remembering Steve Matusch, Sudbury Rocks! race founder

Matusch, who died earlier this year, founded the race in 2005

Martha Dillman · CBC News · Posted: Oct 21, 2020

Steve Matusch, the founder of the Sudbury Rocks! race, was always at the event to cheer on participants and sometimes take part himself. Matusch died earlier this year. (Submitted by Vince Perdue)

As the annual Sudbury Rocks race draws closer, many are taking time to remember the man who founded the race. Steve Matusch started the race in 2005 but recently developed primary sclerosing cholangitis, which led to a rare and aggressive form of liver cancer. He died on March 11 at the age of 52. Matusch's wife, Christina Visser, says it all started when Matusch and other organizers moved a race called the Sunrun onto the streets. It had initially taken place at the trails at Laurentian. She laughs as she thinks back to that first race. "I have to admit I didn't attend as my daughter was six days old at the time," she said. "So I was the supportive mother rather than the supportive wife that day." But Visser says Matusch was extremely proud of the success of that first event. It's been happening each year in Sudbury ever since. "Steve encouraged everyone to try running," Visser said. "He wasn't about the elite runners. I mean, he encouraged them too, of course. But he was just as happy or happier to have someone come and just be happy to finish the 5k." Christina Visser says she's not sure what she will do with her family on the day of the race, but says it will be a "sad, meaningful day." (Martha Dillman/CBC) Visser says Matusch started running a few years before their children were born. He decided that Sudbury "needed to have a proper marathon and then it had to be a Boston qualifier." "And he made that happen in a very short time," she recalled. "When he decided something should happen, he made it happen." This will be the first race held without Matusch. The half marathon, one of his favourite runs, is named in his honour. It will also be the first time the race is held virtually, due to COVID-19, with participants choosing their own routes. Proceeds will be donated to the Northern Cancer Foundation, which supports people in Sudbury and across the region who are receiving cancer treatment. "It's been a challenging year," Visser said. "The race was very important to Steve. It was part of his legacy, along with the business. This was a big deal to him, so it feels like as big a deal or a bigger deal to me than it ever has before." Their oldest son, Brendon, is currently away at university while Annika lives at home. Visser says she's not sure what she and her family will do on the day of the race. She says although she'd like to gather with others on that day, current pandemic restrictions making getting together difficult. "One way or another, it's going to be a sad, meaningful day," she said.

 

 

 

COVID 19 did not put a damper on the 49th annual Wiky Roadrace. And although the day was a little wet and windy, conditions for walking and running were actually quite favourable with a helping breeze to push us to the finish line. Congratulations to Rocks!! member Tricia Goeldner for her first place in the 10k run. Aurel Fox was overall male winner. I do not have 5k times. All first wave 10kers can deduct 1:14 off their total time. There was a late start. All Results Here

 

---

It might seem strange to suggest that a race of more than 150 participants could include a heavy dose of on-course loneliness, but that was exactly the case for the 2020 Turkey Gobbler in Naughton, an event which featured athletes leaving the start line in five different waves.

"It was a little bit different, in that you're solitary," noted Sudbury Fitness Challenge mainstay Donna Smrek. "We were three friends in a row, so it became a slightly different game out there for us, with someone to chase."

Likewise and of similar mindset, Lo-Ellen Park Knights' senior Eran Bursey chased down a good number of his wave co-horts, recording the fifth fastest men's time in his distance, covering 7.5 kms in 31:57.

"Usually, you have a big pack of runners of similar speed," said the 16 year old veteran of the south-end cross-country powerhouse. "There's a lot of strategy. In a race like this, it's much more of a mental game."

"You might be three kms in and you feel so dead, but you know that you still have the bulk of the race left, and you're alone for most of it."

An avid treadmill runner, Travis Annett of Lockerby Composite might typically find the motivation to psh forward in his Netflix choice of the day, perhaps the Formula I series, Drive to Survive.

"Just because they're all racing, it's all fast, so it motivates me because I'm like a race car out there, going really fast," he explained with a laugh. No such environment for this race day.

"It's a lot more weird, not being out there with people your pace," Annett added. "There were obviously some people out here not going as hard as some others, just out here trying to get some exercise and not really racing it."

"It's just weird to run past those people, because you would never really see them in the mass starts. It was pretty lonely, by the end, with no one around."

Now on the other side of her 50th birthday, Donna Smrek is used to running on her own - for quite a ways, actually. "I've been working on my distances, so trying to get a little longer, which has slowed me down," she said.

"But with us, we're all in that fun competitive bubble. I think we run more for the social side. I'm not breaking any records, but I feel stronger, taking the time to recover. I am in that over 50 group and want to stay healthy, just so that I can keep doing it."

"I was sneaking into the ultra distances - 50km was the goal, but my race (Ragnar Ontario Trail) was cancelled - but I could see it going there. It's just the rush of something different that drives you there. I could see myself stretching out to 50 kms and then trying to do it consistent - not fast, but consistent."

Beyond the lack of companionship on the trails, the runners also shared one other takeaway from their Sunday adventure. "I can tell you what I don't like - all of the hills," laughed Smrek.

"I'm pretty sure (race organizer) Neil (Phipps) got us through all of them. Somehow he managed to work in five major climbs but only two downhills. Of course, the hills mean that you get to the top of something, and I'm not going fast enough that I don't appreciate the view when I get there."

"At this time of the year, the colours are beautiful."

Eran Bursey might have been a tad more oblivious to the scenery, given the speed at which it was flying by.

"This course is tricky, because you're feeling pretty good, and then you get to that single track section, really windy with the huge hill," he said. "That really kills you."

Mind you, overcoming those nasty hills is a process made much easier when athletes take the proper approach to race day, a definite source of pride at Lo-Ellen Park Secondary School.

"Throughout high-school, you really learn that it's the days before the race that really make the difference," said Bursey. "When you get against the good high-school competition and everybody is training, it really is about whoever prepares the best, getting good hydration, sleep, nutrition, things like that."

Good news - it definitely paid off on Sunday for Bursey. "I was four seconds fast on my pace the whole race, so that's good," he said. "I was going for a 32 minutes, and I broke that by a little bit. I was just trying to focus on catching just one person in front of me at a time."

That sense of competitiveness is also apparent in chatting with Travis Annett, as the 16 year-old grade 11 athlete looks to a fall schedule that now appears likely to include at least a few high-school races in the mix.

"It doesn't sound like every school will be there, but I will try and just stick with the kids that beat me last year and stay ahead of the guys that I beat last year," he said. "Really, just do the best that I can."

Where some of the athletes arrive on the SDSSAA cross-country scene, already armed with name recognition with the local circuit, Annett developed moreso upon his arrival at Lockerby Composite.

"I did some running in grade four and up, but really just to miss school - anything to get out of school," he acknowledged with a smile. "In the summer of grade nine, my father started encouraging me to get out to the track a bit, just to train for whatever sports."

"I started out my grade nine high-school season a lot better than I thought I would do, and then started taking it a lot more seriously."

As for the Naughton Trails, Annett was struck by much the same features as many of his fellow runners. "It's very hilly," he said. "Well, I guess all of the Sudbury trails are hilly. But this one is tricky in what I think they call the roller-coaster section, where it's single track and really windy."

"That's interesting, with a lot of tight corners."

But in a year like this one, athletes are more prepared than ever for just about anything to come their way, right around the next corner.

Following are some results from the 2020 Turkey Gobbler:

Women's - 7.5 km distance
1st - Sara McIlraith - 35:00
2nd - Jayde Hurley - 36:27
3rd - Kalila Hamilton-Bachiu - 38:12
4th - Mia Toner - 38:58
5th - Lexi Ransom - 39:23

Men's - 7.5 km distance
1st - Kendyn Mashinter - 27:43
2nd - Eric Leishman - 28:40
3rd - Alex Lambert - 30:35
4th - Patrick Wiss - 31:37
5th - Eran Bursey - 31:57

Women's - 3 km distance
1st - Maren Kasunich - 12:04
2nd - Bree Bourget - 13:47
3rd - Mira Battaion - 15:21
4th - Ava Hodgins - 15:35
5th - Isabel McKague - 15:35

Men's - 3 km distance
1st - Callum Wiss - 13:10
2nd - Robbie Jones - 13:38
3rd - Griffin Jones - 14:06
4th - Aaron Bolton - 14:51
5th - Frank Battaion - 14:55

Final Standings Sara McIlraith overall female winner Neil Phipps overall male winner Lucia Salmaso F UNDER 12 Isabella Mastroianni F13-19 Marlee Clement F20-29 Jess Lonsdale F30-39 Sara McIlraith F40-49 (OVERALL WINNER!!!) Donna Smrek F50-59 Mariane Larose F60-69 Maureen Moustgaard F70-79 ------------------------------------------- Julian Luoma M12&UNDER Kaeden Ward M13-19 Nick Vanderschoor M20-29 Dan Whalen M30-39 Mike Banks M40-49 Neil Phipps M50-59 (Men's Winner) Frank Battaion M60-69 John Larmer M70-79 CONGRATULATIONS to you all!!!

 

 

 

Ashley on Laurentian trails

Donna at Beaver Pond trail

Gravel Bike group going to Crowley Lake

Crowley Lake

Mimi at Bennett Lake

Neil and Sara at Silver peak

Minnow Lake

Minnow Lake

Minnow Lake

Minnow Lake

Laurentian Lake

Laurentian Lake

Laurentian Lake

Robinson Lake

Walden Trails

Walden Trails

Minnow Lake before the storm

Storm over Minnow Lake

Finlandia