Andrea Seccafien smashes Canadian 10,000m record at Sound Running Track Meet

Andrea Seccafien dominated a very crowded women’s 10,000m tonight at Sound Running’s Track Meet in California, and her 31:13.94 time is a new Canadian record (by almost 28 seconds), as well as being well under the Olympic standard of 31:25. Seccafien also holds the national record in the half-marathon, at 1:09:38.

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Ednah Kurgat was second, almost eight seconds back, in 31:21.65, and Sara Hall (who has performed brilliantly in the marathon twice in the last few months) was third in 31:21.90. All three achieved Olympic standard. Seccafien and Hall traded the lead a couple of times, with Kurgat overtaking Hall late in the race.

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The previous Canadian record was set at 31:41.59 by Natasha Wodak in 2015. Wodak recently moved up to the marathon, achieving Olympic standard and the second-fastest Canadian marathon time in history at The Marathon Project in Arizona in December 2020. 

Seccafien, who lives and trains in Australia, ran her previous PB of 31:45 at at a meet there in January. She’s been in the U.S., training at altitude in Arizona in the weeks preceding tonight’s race. She set the Canadian record in the half-marathon in February 2020, at Marugame, Japan.

Saturday’s afternoon events (including the top heats of the men’s and women’s 800m and 1,500m) will be broadcast live on ESPN, but the 10,000m races on Friday night and the distance races on Saturday night from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. EST will be streamed live via pay-per-view. The cost is $5.99 USD, which will allow you to watch both Friday and Saturday night, with 90 per cent of the proceeds going to the athletes in the form of prize money. You can purchase a ticket through the meet website. And for full results, click here.

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