This Sunday, an amazing team of youth will be running their first 5K at Canada Army Run. Lisa Georges, iRun’s Publisher, has been training with a small group from Operation Come Home, Ottawa’s employment, education, and support centre for homeless and at-risk youth age 16 and up, leading up to the powerful event, which will see just under 22,000 cross the finish line this year.
From left: Maggie, Melissa and Vitaly dig their new kicks!
Special thanks to Coach Brock from Skywalker Fitness who designed the training plan that got the team to the start line, and Doug from Sports4 for fitting the team for shoes, donated by the Ottawa independent running store.
“As a sponsor of Canada Army Run , we’re fortunate to receive complementary entries into this amazing event,” says Georges. “We know what crossing the finish line at Canada Army Run feels like — we see it, we hear about it from our audience and we have experienced it ourselves: it is an incredibly empowering and unforgettable moment. We wanted to share that experience with the youth from Operation Come Home this year.”
Only days aways form the September 22 event, 21 year old team member, Melissa, shares her thoughts leading up to the big day:
I stopped running five years ago, shortly after high school. At the beginning of this summer, I started to go for long walks with my dog and decided to make a big lifestyle change: improve my eating habits, drink way more water and run intervals.
I wanted to take this opportunity from iRun to do the Army Run 5K to see if I still had the momentum and drive to complete the distance. I started to train more — adding endurance training into my workouts and running four or five times a week, in addition to the weekly group trainings runs and tips.
Now it’s 3 days before the race and the anticipation is killing me. I can’t wait to feel that vibe of everyone around you — the thrill and excitement of race day!
Well said, Melissa! We look forward to watching you and the rest of the team cross the finish line on Sunday!
Read this year’s winning entry into the ‘Why do you run Canada Army Run?’ contest.
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