2002

2002

Warm, sunny weather proved a welcome relief from what seemed a myriad of bad weather meets in previous years. Veteran sprinter Bruny Surin suffered an injury and pulled out of the men’s 100 metres, leaving Nicolas Macrozonaris to maintain Canada’s hopes in the 100 metres, which he did despite a bad start, winning in 10.43 seconds. American Gerald Williams was second in 10.47.

Meantime, one-lap sprinter Shane Niemi gave himself a 24th birthday present in winning the men’s 400 metres in a meet record 45.20 seconds. Canadian high jumper Mark Boswell, second at the 1999 world championships in Spain, just missed rewriting his Canadian record with an unsuccessful leap at 2.36 metres, but he still won the event with a 2.30 effort, just one centimetre off the meet mark established by Brent Harken many years earlier. Emilie Mondor, who moved from Quebec to study at Simon Fraser University, proved best in the women’s 1,500 metres. Her time of 4:11.84 was a personal best by a remarkable five seconds.