Two weeks, four races and 40,000 kilometres

Perry Mackinnon of Coaticook, Que., is no stranger to high mileage. But a last-minute surprise selection to represent Team Canada on the world stage took the 25-year-old Agricultural Sciences student on an unforgettable 40,000 km journey across the world—racing four times in two weeks.

Heading into his final NCAA indoor track season at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., Mackinnon had goals of qualifying for the indoor 3,000-5,000m double at the Ivy League Heptagonal Indoor Track & Field Championships (known as Heps) in late February.

On Feb. 1, Mackinnon found out he was selected to represent Team Canada at the 2023 World XC Championships in Bathurst, Australia, after he received a screenshot of the Athletics Canada announcement from a friend.

“When Athletics Canada posted the list of athletes, I found out,” laughs Mackinnon. “They called, but I missed the call, since I was out running.”

Since Mackinnon did not have a national team call-up on his radar, he immediately called his Cornell coach Mike Henderson. “At first, we weren’t sure if it would be possible to fit World XC in, but we worked it out,” says Mackinnon.

Mackinnon was registered to race in the men’s 3,000m at the David Hemery Valentine meet at Boston University on Feb. 11, where he ran a personal best of 7:57.01. The following morning, he started his 24-hour journey from Boston to L.A. and L.A. to Sydney, Australia.

Luckily Mackinnon had some Canadian company on the plane; he was joined by 2016 Olympian Erin Teschuk and 2022 Canadian XC champion Julie-Anne Staehli, who both raced in Boston and were also selected to represent Canada in Australia.

Seventeen thousand kilometres later, Mackinnon arrived in Australia on Feb. 14 and made the three-hour trip to Bathurst (a small town of 35,000, about 200 kilometres west-northwest of Sydney). 

On Feb. 18, he made his Team Canada debut in the 4x 2 km relay race, running the third leg for Canada and helping the team place eighth overall. 

“World XC was awesome,” he says. ” It was one of the coolest races I’ve been a part of.”

Mackinnon’s journey to Australia wasn’t as long as he would’ve liked. The following morning, he was back on his way to Sydney to catch a flight back to campus in Ithaca, to ensure he could make it back to run at Heps the following weekend.

“My coach and I knew this journey would be a lot,” says Mackinnon. “Once I got home on the 20th, I slept for 11 hours and felt brand new… I even had the energy to attend the (Cornell) team workout that evening.”

He ended his journey in the best way possible, reaching the podium in the men’s 3,000m at Heps and breaking the 14-minute barrier for 5,000m the following day (Feb. 26) in 13:56.34.

Now that the NCAA indoor season is near its end, Mackinnon says he will take some downtime of “a few 100-mile weeks” before ramping things up for the NCAA outdoor season in early April. “I am very behind in schoolwork,” he laughs.

“The entire month has been an incredible experience, and I’d do it all again in a heartbeat,” he says.