THUNDER BAY – Sean Fincham clinched a second-straight XCM Nationals championship on Saturday, edging teammate, and 2023 champion, Andrew L’Esperance by less than 30 seconds to capture the elite men’s title.
Fincham, who hails from Squamish, B.C., conquered a grueling Trowbridge Falls course that took riders through Centennial Park, pulling away late in the race to capture a top-of-the podium finish, finishing in a time of 4:17:06.4, about 19 minutes more than last year’s winning time, on a revamped route that added a little more work to the 90-kilometre race.
In the women’s race, Waterloo, Ont.’s Haley Smith survived a catastrophic tire failure on her third and final lap, still managing to cross the finish line 27:52 ahead of her closest competitor, Guelph’s Sara Frangos, one of just five competitors in a thin elite women’s field, in time of 5:25:13.5.
“It was a super-tight battle,” Fincham said. “I knew it was going to be. L’Espy and I are good friends and we train together and race together a lot. It was going to be a last-lap battle and I managed to have a little more kick on the last four or five K.”
His margin of victory was just 28.3 seconds.
Getting back-to-back national titles is huge, Fincham said.
“I’m stoked. You can’t ask for much more. Thunder Bay has been really good to me,” he said.
Smith, who has a reminder, ‘be who you are,’ written on her left handlebar, an inspiration to stay focused and push herself to be the best racer she can be, said it was a tough slog out there, a year after finishing third in the competition.
“The terrain up here is unrelenting. It feels like a very savage effort. The power outlet isn’t insanely high, but it’s very physical, so it’s really rewarding to finish. For everyone out there who finishes three laps, even two laps of this course, it’s a very big accomplishment,” said Smith, a former Olympian who finished 29th in the women’s cross-country event at the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.
Winning another national championship is a great feeling, she said.
“It’s a huge honour to wear the Maple Leaf in whatever discipline you win a national championship in. Because I mostly race internationally, it’s really cool to wear that special jersey when I’m in the States or in Europe or in Africa or wherever I am. It’s an honour and a responsibility,” Smith said.
The elite-level racers weren’t the only athletes on course on Saturday.
In the U17 men’s category, Thunder Bay’s Callum MacIsaac took the crown, edging Sunnyside, Ont.’s Jackson Byers by 11:44, finishing the 60-kilometre face in 3:29:47.0.
Thunder Bay’s Hanna Abbink was the U17 women’s champion, winning in 4:49:21.7. Slate River’s Nolan Nyitrai took the U19 title, in 3:59:12.5, while Shuniah’s Kyle Fry was the 35-44 master’s winner, with a time of 3:06:06.5.
Winnipeg’s Christine McKinley was the first-place finisher in the women’s master’s 35-44 category, her race time of 4:08:44.3 good for a 20-minute win over Thunder Bay’s Gwendolyn Buttemer.
Dundas, Ont.’s Paul Cobham won the master’s male 45-54 category, with Thunder Bay’s Karla Bailey capturing the women’s event, in a time of 4:04:35.0. Michael Davidson of Port Sydney, Ont. took the master’s men 55+ race, crossing the line in 3:45:52.1.
In Friday’s mini miner race, Thunder Bay’s Sawyer Gibson topped the field in a time of 16:37.4 and Beatrice Boisvert Picard won the girl’s race, in a time of 17:24.3.
