Building confidence one race at a time
By: Julia Vellucci
Humber Athletics Communications
Catherine Irwin began her cross-country journey in the third grade, running for over a decade because she wasn't athletically gifted in other areas and wanted to play a sport.
She is competing in her second year of cross country at Humber Polytechnic but has previously ran for St. Lawrence College for two years and is now in her fourth year of OCAA eligibility.
"I decided, okay, I'll give this a try. I was never really good, but I enjoyed the process of putting in the work every day and then seeing the benefits come later on. Also, running just makes me feel good as well," Irwin said.
She was training more consistently year-round, took it much more seriously when COVID hit, using that time to get ahead and having the low expectation of wanting to finish mid-pack at St. Lawrence.
"I didn't know what the competition was like so when I turned up to that first meet, the race began and I was doing perfectly fine. But because I never won a race before and I was never a lead runner, I was doubting myself," Irwin said.
"I'm like I shouldn't be up at the front but I noticed all the other girls were fatigued very early in the race. I made a move there and won my first OCAA race and that continued for my full year. I won OCAAs in my first year and then my second year was a similar outcome, except I did come second two out of the four races," she continued.
"My third year, last year I kind of struggled with a stress fracture in the late end of August, so it was hard to gain the fitness back in the season. I ended up not achieving what I wanted to last year. But I still did pretty good. I did okay, just not what I was expecting and I have higher standards for myself," she said.
Irwin placed 33rd at nationals last year and has been really consistent this year through the summer, putting in a bit of work every day, doing a lot better and exceeding her own expectations so far.
At St. Lawrence, she had a really good coach, Tanya Deeks, who encouraged her to believe in herself and inspired her to get really fast.
"She was the first one to truly believe in what I'm capable of doing, and I think that's a lot of what I struggle with is I don't believe I can achieve certain things, which obviously leads to a mental block," Irwin said.
Right now, she is trying to focus on what she can do, possibly winning another OCAA championship and becoming an All-Canadian.
"I was an All-Canadian my first year and it's been really tough competition at the national level since then, so I would love to be able to do that again this year," Irwin said.
Blaise Uglow is on Humber's Men's Cross Country team for his third year, did the Humber 5K last year and has the goal of making it to the 2028 Olympics for triathlon.
Uglow has been doing this whole triathlete thing since the eighth grade and has been doing it for about five years professionally.
"Cross country is not something I'm really an expert at it. It's been my third year running cross country. I'm a professional triathlete though. That is mostly what I do, so I'm using it as a fitness builder for my season," he said.
"Being a professional triathlete means racing across the world on the international level. I am hoping to get on Team Canada next year, 2025," Uglow said.
He is aspiring to get in the U23 World Championships which he is spending 20 hours a week training, swimming, biking and running to prepare.
"Starting in February there's races and you gain points. By qualifying and placing well in those, you're kind of just seeing more and then you have more of a chance to get selected for the national team and to qualify for the Olympics," Uglow said.
He said it is a constant mental struggle to keep up with the training but wouldn't undergo all of this if he didn't have a love for it.
