Top Canadians looking to regain 10K titles

Two of Canada’s top 10Ks are scheduled for Sunday morning in two of Canada’s largest cities.

The Yonge Street 10K and the Vancouver Sun Run will see thousands of runners race through the downtown cores of the two cities.

In Toronto, defending champion Eric Gillis will look to defend his title from the 2014 edition of the race. Gillis won on the fast, downhill course last year in 28:32. Gillis seems prepped for a strong performance, coming off a recent win at Harry’s Spring Run-Off in Toronto’s High Park over Easter weekend, his first race since the Toronto Waterfront Marathon last fall.

Gillis’s top competition will likely come from Matt Loiselle and Sami Jibril, two Toronto training partners. Loiselle was second to Gillis in the Spring Run-Off. Kenyan Paul Kimugal, a regular on the Canadian race circuit, will also be looking for a win.

Lanni Marchant, the Canadian record holder in the marathon and half-marathon, will look to regain her 2013 title in the race down Yonge Street, though 2012 champion Tarah Korir will also be looking for another win on the course.

Marchant recently won the Modo Spring Run-Off 8K in Vancouver’s Stanley Park, a race that saw Kelly Wiebe take the men’s title, though Wiebe this weekend will be looking for his second Vancouver Sun Run win.

Wiebe won the Sun Run in 2012, his first time racing the event. Last spring he was scheduled to race but a staph infection left him in the hospital instead of on the roads. The 25-year-old also recently finished at the top Canadian at the world cross-country championships.

Both races will start at 9 a.m. in their respective time zones.