Like the Energizer bunny, Florence Barron, just keeps on going. Barron, who is now 86, participated in the annual Capital Subaru Cape to Cabot 20K Road Race 2024 in St. John’s, N.L. on Sunday, marking her 11th year of participation at the event. Her time was 2:28:44.
The men’s side also had an 80+ competitor: Bill Saunders, 80, finished the race in 2:16:13.
The very hilly and challenging Cape to Cabot 20K begins at Cape Spear National Historic Site (the most easterly point of land in North America) and finishes at Signal Hill in St. John’s and consists of about 17 km of rolling hills, with a long climb at the end.
Barron has been running races and breaking age-group records in Newfoundland and beyond for years; her personal best at the event is 2:06:58, from 2017. “I enjoy it so much, and I feel good about it,” Barron told CTV news last year about her (then) 26 years of running. “So long as I feel good, I think I’ll keep going.”
Mark Greene and Allyson Stuckless took the wins at Sunday’s race, in 1:17:02 and 1:32:36, respectively.
Greene and Stuckless also won the MUNN Mile, which is the final 1.6 km of the race, an uphill climb to the finish line. Green’s time was 8:43; Stuckless’s was 10:34.
Barron was inducted into the Newfoundland and Labrador Sports Hall of Fame in 2022. Her records include two in France, for being both the fastest woman 70s and 80s to complete an annual 25-kilometre race on the French island of Miquelon, off Newfoundland’s southern coast. She frequents races all over Atlantic Canada.
For full results of the 2024 Cape to Cabot 20K Road Race, click here.
