After hitting 90 the drop off in performance is pretty drastic, said one of Powell River’s oldest and most decorated athletes.
Despite this, Harry Thompson, Powell River’s answer to the United Kingdom’s Fauja Singh, is continuing his winning and record-setting ways.
Thompson, 91, ran the 3,000-metre race at the 2014 Van Ryswyk Indoor Invitational and BC Masters Indoor Championship in Kamloops last month.
He said that often with older runners they are not able to run the whole distance and have to walk parts, but he decided that he would complete the whole distance without slowing down.
“I’m really happy with that,” he said. He set a record for his three-kilometre run at 24.53.52.
On the first day of the meet, he ran the 60- and 400-metre races. He said it wasn’t his intention to break records, but in the 60-metre he beat William Falconer’s 2011 record of 15.91 with his run of 13.35.
Thompson said that he now holds all the indoor records from 60 up to 3,000 metres and is hoping to do the same this summer for all the outdoor distances in Kelowna at the outdoor masters track event.
