Overcoming obstacles: Bob Hardy, the walker-runner

When Bob Hardy of Alexandria, Ont., gave up bike racing due to blood clots in 2012 at age 61, he felt lost. Hardy had to sell his best friend (his bicycle) and move away from the sport he loved. But Hardy is accustomed to treating barriers as challenges, and for him, this was just another challenge to be overcome. It’s what led to him entering running races, using a walker for balance.

In 2001, Hardy won a long battle with leukemia, thanks to a bone marrow transplant. He describes himself as a go-getter, inspired by challenges (adding that his wife says he’s crazy). After losing cycling, he was craving his next challenge. The 2012 surgery for the blood clots left him without balance. As he recovered in 2013, his wife saw a half-price advertisement for the Hugo rolling walker, which he realized would allow him to get around, even though he’d lost his balance. “I reached out immediately,” Hardy says. “I told them: I want to race with the walker.”

Since 2013, Hardy has logged more than 11,000 kilometres with his walker, including 11 half-marathons, six marathons and one 100K ultra. He’s unable to go as fast as the other runners, so he starts at the back of the pack and continues to chip away at his seven- to eight-minute-per-kilometre pace.

Like any new skill, running with a walker took time to learn. “I studied race walking, and had to install aero bars on the walker to make it more sporty,” he says. In 2016, Hardy found himself on the start-line of his first marathon, at Ottawa Race Weekend. He finished, but was disappointed with his time of 6:38. Over the next three years, he managed to get his time down to 5:23, which he ran at the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon in 2018.

To this day, Hardy still battles with his balance. He also suffers from severe sciatica in his hips. “No matter the obstacle, I know I can’t give up,” Hardy says, adding “I’ve been fighting for more than 20 years now, from my bone marrow transplant for leukemia to a blood clot in my intestine and neck.”

Hardy returns to Ottawa Race Weekend on Saturday evening to run the 10K and get as close as he can to that one-hour mark with his new best friend — his Hugo walker.