Negative 5 million degrees outer space mode cold open
Yeah, let’s eat the low-hanging fruit to start shall we?
FIRST, when we were doing research for this event and checked out the Canadian Track and Field Tour results page, we realized that all the results listed were still from 2023. It took us 30 minutes to make our own page with 2024 Track and Field Tour results. Athletics Canada pal, what are ya doing? Gets paid a million bucks and can’t update results? Ya kidding me? We don’t even get paid at all! We actually PAY to make results pages. We LOSE MONEY to do your job for you. Holy heck. You can donate to our fund by going to this link if you want haha. Donate OR DON’T. We better see a hefty donation from Athletics Canada.
SECOND, yeah we put these up late again, brutal, but we got caught up helping people move stuff on the weekend, which was sandwiched around a 45min BA Johnston concert. Here’s a quick preview.
THIRD, the championships are not at Stade olympique de Montréal like what we featured in the header photo. They are at the Complexe sportif Claude-Robillard. We used the Stade for the header because:
- We don’t give a care
- We wanted to put five Not Trackies inside Olympic rings. Deal with it.
We’re also now committed to stan Stades. FUCK Complexe. Stade >>>>>>> Complexe.
FOURTH, in case you missed it, the track at the COMPLEXE went bathtub mode and got BUBBLY last week. I mean it’s an absolute champagne party over there. That’s the second L for les complexes dans les deux derniers paragraphs!!! Complexe se fait botter le cul. But ANYWAY, we should probably have a discussion about how the climate crisis already causes harm to millions of people each year, largely in the poorest countries even though they are the least to blame. Unless you want to deal with EVEN MORE jacuzzi-style bubble tracks, and unless you LOVE snorting forest fire fumes while you train, you should probably suck it up and get political. Maybe join a group of good folks who pressure the government to stop building pipelines on Indigenous territories, for example.
But yeah, let’s go giraffe mode and transition to the high-hanging fruit. If you can’t handle it, skip to the next section.
We would like to give a shoutout to Majed Abu Mahareel, Palestine’s first Olympian who raced the 10,000m at the 1996 Games in Atlanta. He died two weeks ago from kidney failure as a result of Israel’s genocide campaign in Gaza that has rendered healthcare treatments inaccessible to many Palestinians.
Canada allowed a record amount of military goods to be sent to Israel in 2023, even as numerous human rights groups have published lengthy reports that detail Israel’s apartheid system, including Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and B’Tselem. Canada also allowed millions of dollars of military goods to be sent after Israel began its latest military onslaught in October. This is one of the clearest cases of human rights violations occurring in the world today, but Canadian politicians continue to give both vocal and material support to Israel. It’s not so surprising that we support Israel’s occupation of Palestine though. Canada has been occupying Indigenous territory since this country was founded. Only 13 out of 94 calls to action made by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission have been fulfilled since its report was published in 2015, and we continue to do really great (sarcasm) stuff like fund militarized police units to push Indigenous folks off their land so that we can build unnecessary oil and gas pipelines on it.
Canadian athletes competing out there this weekend should understand that if you fly the Canadian flag after winning your event, it validates the human rights violations this country is responsible for. No good this country does can justify the harm it causes.
It’s actually super obvious. Should you compete under the banner of a country that is enabling a genocide? No. Should you compete under the banner of a country that still perpetuates harm caused by its own genocide? No. Most people agree with these statements, but when you point out that Canada is unquestionably guilty of both of these things, people come up with all sorts of disingenuous excuses.
Imagine telling an Indigenous person that you choose to represent Canada because even though we keep stealing their land, the people doing the stealing have some tolerance for multiculturalism.
Imagine telling a Palestinian that you choose to represent Canada because even though we are arming the country that is mass murdering them, we accept a good number of immigrants.
Couldn’t be me.
Many people may react defensively to this sort of take. Remember, this is RunningHotTakes after all. We hope people can reflect on this and ditch the mindset of “If Canada does bad things, then that makes me bad.” It doesn’t make you bad. It does mean you have a responsibility to try and change things though.
Some other people may react by saying “don’t bring politics into sports,” but representing your country is inherently political. One of the most prominent sports photos of all time was a political statement, featuring John Carlos and Tommie Smtih raising their fists on the podium at the 1968 Olympics in protest of USA’s discrimination against Black people. Interestingly, John Carlos has signed on with Athletes for Ceasefire, a group of 295, mostly American athletes who recognize USA’s role in arming Israel and so want Joe Biden to call for a ceasefire.
A group called Canadian Sport For Palestine is on to something. They are calling for athletes on national teams to cover the Canadian flag on their competition uniforms until the Canadian government stops arming Israel and fulfills the 94 Truth and Reconciliation calls to action. You can add your name to their open letter here.
Long story short, Canada isn’t worth defending, cover the Canadian flag on competition uniforms, don’t fly the Canadian flag. Easy enough. Let’s get to the predictions already.
Day 1 (Wednesday)
Sorry hammer throwers. We weren’t in time to predict who would shoot construction equipment out of their arm cannons the furthest. That’s fine though. We wanted to mail in our predictions anyway. The post-event recaps are more fun, so let’s RECAP the hammer throw.
Women’s Hammer Throw: Defending world champion Cammy Rogers launches one in round two that was 2 metres below her season’s best but was another mark clear of the Olympic standard. Then she took a seat because why not? Kaila Butler, who placed second last year, was also going airplane mode and sending hammers flying off the runway, but unfortunately came just a couple metres short of slotting into a quota position that qualifies athletes for the Olympics. Still good enough for another national silver though.
Men’s Hammer Throw: Yeah, Zberg, Hammerton, and AK-16 (Adam Keenan machine tossing 16 lb hammers) hit up 1-2-3 and go concrete mode to cement themselves further into the world rankings. These guys are like millions of peaches for free out there I mean you better LOOK OUT for them at the Olympics.
Day 2 (Thursday)
Women’s Javelin: Yeah, Liz Gleadle is back after skipping last year to try and reclaim the national title after winning eight in a row (and 11 total). She’s gonna have to contend with defending champion Ashley Pryke and NCAA standout Sara Eniko.
Men’s Pole Vault: Defending champion Nojah Parker comes in competing against 2019 champion Derek Theodore and 2022 champion Nathan Filipek. These guys must have called up some beavers because it’s a log jam at the top of the rankings here, with the best 5 guys having vaulted between 5.00 and 5.15 so far this season and having finished in many different orders during the national track and field tour.
Women’s 3000m Steeplechase: Regan Yee (Haw) won it last year, Ceili McCabe won it in 2022. Who’s gonna dial it in this time? Can Grace Featherstonhaugh be a factor? Maybe 2014 and 2013 national champion Jessica Furlan can go catch mode and throw it back. We’re mostly just surprised that this is the first time we thought of the Yee Haw joke over the last 7 years.
Men’s 3000m Steeplechase: Jean-Simone écoutait aux cowboys fringants, et maintenant il est fringant et prêt à partir. Who will finish second? Johnny Gay? Jordan Mac? Aaron It’s Ahl Been Done? One of the two Kevin Robertsons?
Women’s 5000m: Is Regan Yee gonna do a solid here and pace Gabriela Stafford to a fast time? I think I would rather put my legs in a blender instead of running a steeplechase followed by a 5000m two hours later. That’s why we expect she is signed up to pace instead. Yee finds herself in the Olympics quota for the 5000m AND the steeplechase, so might decide to run both events there when there is more time to rest in-between races. Back to Stafford though. She was the Canadian 1500m champion from 2016-2019, and has been an Olympics and Worlds finalist. After dealing with injuries for a while post Tokyo, she could qualify for the Olympics in the 5000m this time if she runs fast enough. RunningHotTakes statisticians are unofficially saying she needs to run at least 15:11 (and take the win) to put herself into a temporary Olympic position. Her PB is 14:31, so it’s doable, but she’s still on the road back from injury so it’s gonna be close. She ran 15:17 two weeks ago at Harry Jerome and looked pretty swanky over the last km.
WHO ELSE though. Briana Scott won it last year, don’t count her out. Gracelyn Larkin won in 2022. Don’t count her out. Julie-Anne Staehli was second in both of those races. DON’T COUNT HER OUT.
Men’s 5000m: Well it’s a tough ask for anyone when Moh Ahmed decides to show up at his allotted one Canadian championship per season. This year it’s the 5000m. He’s only been an Olympic silver medalist. The interesting bit of the race will be to see how much of a challenge Ben Flanagan and Thomas Fafard can put up. Flanagan has run the Olympic standard, whereas Fafard finds himself just inside the world rankings quota to qualify for Paris after running a huge 13:05, 28 second PB this season. He could use another quick time to cement his position. Not Trackie statisticians are saying he needs to run at least a 13:22 to do that if he wins the race. If he places third, he needs to run a 13:17. Cette course est habituellement lente et tactique, mais les québécoise bon jacks va probablement se mettre en mode vaisseau spatial et tenter de lancer Fafard. Charles Philibert-Thiboutot devrait y contribuer. Enfin, chaque fois que je pense à Fafard, cela me fait penser à ce fan des Canadiens qui dit de façon experte “Tomas Tatar”. Voici ma tentative et c’est ainsi que se termine la «Day 2.»
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