John Gay - Straining & Striving to Tokyo

John Gay - 3000m Steeplechase

Coming from sports like BMX racing and moguls skiing as a youth (each with some finesse elements to them), when John shifted his attention to track in grade 12 he quickly reveled in the grinders' event that is the steeplechase. Seemingly, he could just put his head down and work and work and work his way to success. 

This paid off for a while as his insatiable work ethic initially fueled his rapid rise through the sport.

But then, as he vulnerably shared in our body image seminar a few weeks ago, John struggled with an eating disorder during the early years of his university career.

He had to learn the hard way that you can't simply just suffer your way to success.

Since then, John has become more strategic and balanced in his approach to training.

In fact one of the reasons why he took on the Manager role within our club is because he had grown to know himself well enough to understand that his personality required more structure and balance in his life beyond just running.

Unwavering loyalty has always been a strong suit of John's. That loyalty is what has him so entrenched and dedicated to our Thunderbirds community, and it is why all of your support and comradery do so much to fuel him in his own athletic pursuits.

While many endurance athletes spent the winter at high altitude training camps in Arizona, John forwent the first few weeks of his training camp so that he could be here preparing for and executing our most successful manure sale yet.

As soon as he was able to wrap up the loose ends from the manure sale, he headed down to Arizona to salvage some high altitude training and then some competitions.

Although his trip was fruitful in terms of positioning him to be selected to the Olympic team, John found it difficult to be away from his support network for so long. So he decided to return home at the end of May.

While John was stuck in quarantine, competitions were heating up elsewhere around the globe. John's world ranking kept dropping - to the point where he was dangerously close to getting bumped outside of the top 45 that would get to compete in Tokyo.

But being the selfless individual that he is, the first day John was out of quarantine he helped pace a former Tbird and frequent training partner Luc Bruchet to Olympic standard in the 5000m at the Harry Jerome. Only then did he turn his attention back to his own qualification process.

He lined up a final attempt to hit the auto-standard, but that fell through at the last minute.

He and his coach CJ quickly pivoted and got John added to the Canadian Olympic Trials start list. There would be no pacers or competitors of his calibre to push John along or trade leads with.

Buoyed by the momentum and support he received from the BC running community over the previous few weeks, he courageously went out at Olympic standard pace. Ultimately he was able to hold on for all 3000m (plus barriers) to run under the auto-standard time and break Tbirds Coach Graeme Fell's longstanding Championship record (set in 1986).

Thank you John for being the epitome of a selfless teammate, and for showing up every single day with a can-do attitude.

"John has an unparalleled work ethic and approaches his training with drive and determination. He is always positive, supportive, and kind to others. I had the great pleasure of watching him run the Olympic standard at the Olympic Trials in Montreal. What stands out for me the most about that race is that he took the time to thank every official and volunteer at the meet and congratulated all of his competitors. He truly is a man of character."

- Coach Chris Johnson