Excitement reigned on the streets of Port Elgin (Saugeen Shores) in the early morning hours of Sunday, July 18th as three wheelchair Paralympians raced through the streets in the Canadian Paralympic Marathon Qualifier for the Tokyo Paralympic Games.
Hundreds of people lined the streets over the 42Km route as hometown athlete, Josh Cassidy, raced against the clock to try and qualify for the Canadian team with a time of 1:28:26 ,while Tristan Smyth of B.C. came in a close second at 1:30:00. Ben Brown of Nova Scotia also came out in support and, although Alexandre Dupont of Quebec was expected to race, he suffered an injury and had to withdraw.
Cassidy, who is in the top 10 wheelchair racers in the world, said that he won’t know for a couple of days however if he has made the Canadian team of only 15 spots that will be heading for Tokyo.
It took many volunteers along the route for traffic control where the Town of Saugeen Shores had blocked the streets. Port Elgin Rotary Club and many others from the community volunteered their time.
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