Our Golden Shoe Awards: Master of the Year — Catherine Watkins

Catherine Watkins earns our Golden Shoe Award for the Master of the Year for 2015.

From record setters to incredible age-groupers to those that make it all possible, Canada’s running community has several outstanding individuals. We honour seven deserving runners who have made a huge impact on our sport in the past year. We chose Catherine Watkins as master of the year. 

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Three weeks ahead of the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto, Catherine Watkins was relaxing in her Vancouver home when she got the call: Was she still interested in representing Canada in the women’s marathon?

Despite the short notice, she was ecstatic. Back in May, the 43-year-old travelled to Oregon to run the Eugene Marathon on Mother’s Day. She had two goals: to place well and to hit the Pan Am standard. It was her first race since winter’s Houston Marathon where she suffered from GI issues for the full 42.2k. But in Eugene, she competed well and placed first. Watkins is a mother of two girls – Taya and Olivia – and that win itself made 2015 a Mother’s Day the family will never forget. But as for the second goal, her 2:42:35 time wasn’t enough to send her to the Pan Am Games. She returned to Vancouver describing Eugene’s outcome as “bittersweet.”

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So when she got the call asking her to do some serious last-minute training and race with Toronto’s Rachel Hannah, she cancelled her plans to be relaxing on the beaches of Savary Island on July 18 and instead consulted coach Richard Lee to come up with a plan to get herself in ship-shape for the marathon – in three weeks. At 43, she knew she’d be the oldest athlete in the field. Nervous and excited, a positive Watkins said she’d be doing loads of hill training. Psychologically, she’d be practicing lots of visualization of the course. Three weeks to prepare for a marathon? It’s a tall order. But Watkins has already achieved goals she thought were unattainable. When she first raced a 44-minute 10k PB, she wondered about eventually running a sub-40. Now she runs 33:52. And she never thought she could ever be a Pan Am athlete.

When the July date came around, the former teacher showed up to battle three nasty obstacles: Heat. Humidity. Hills. She placed ninth in 2:51:23. “I did it on three weeks’ notice and I’m so proud and grateful,” she said. “Toronto was amazing.”

When Watkins isn’t running, she’s volunteering with disadvantaged youth in her city or reading for her next book club meet-up. If she wasn’t a runner, she’d still be active in some way playing soccer or, perhaps, cycling through Vancouver.

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