By RON SMITH
Sports Editor
Snow and cold temperatures weren't going to deter Matt Leeder.
Returning home from the sunshine and warmth of Florida, Leeder won the Canadian junior men's cross-country championships in the cold and snow in Guelph on Saturday.
In a national championship where Leeder was edged out at the finish line last year by the hometown favourite, the TISS Pirates graduate beat hometown favourite Kyle Boorsma by eight seconds in the eight-kilometre race.
"Sweet, it was amazing," said Leeder from his dorm room on Monday night. "Last year, I finished second. It was good I could come back and reach my objective.
"This was the coldest race I'd ever run in," said Leeder of temperatures that were -7 Celsius and colder than that with the wind chill at race time. "It felt even colder coming from Florida. I was getting used to the heat and this just felt like it was so cold."
In a race against the top young runners in Canada - and where the all-Ontario cross-country champion finished fourth - Leeder was looking for a top-five finish to help nail down his place on the Canadian junior team for the world championships.
His victory assured him of a travel date for Scotland at the end of March 2008.
Leeder had arrived home in Maitland in the middle of last week and dressed in layers for an evening run on the TISS track to help get acclimatized to the cold weather.
"I was cold," recalled Leeder. "I definitely got used to the cold. The first night back my lungs were shocked. The next day I was fine."
In the nationals, against 200 other runners, Leeder knew the majority of his opposition. He started out, pushing himself near the front of the pack in the four loops of the two-kilometre course.
His strategy was to position himself near the front of the race, gauging the course and the other runners.
After the first two loops, Leeder and Boorsma had separated themselves from the field.
"With 800 metres to go, I started pushing it," said Leeder of the race against his Canadian teammate from the junior Pan-Am Games in Brazil this past summer.
"I just made a surge up a steep hill and he didn't come back at me," said Leeder.
The 17-year-old Leeder, who will turn 18 in two weeks time , finished in 25 minutes and nine seconds.
"It was awesome. I'd never won a national cross-country championship before. I was pretty stoked about it," said Leeder, the Brockville and Area sportsperson of the year in 2005 and 2007.
TISS coach Randy Givogue continues to be impressed with the runner he helped coach for four years.
See LEEDER on page B2
"Matt has so much range. You can stick him in a 4x400. You can stick him in a 10K. Not many runners can do that," said Givogue. "He runs well in any weather conditions. He runs well in the cold, the hot, muddy, sunny. He's good in every condition."
In his initial season at Florida State on a running scholarship, Leeder was 97th overall in the NCAA cross-country championships but was the third freshman across the finish line.
Running an average of 120 kilometres a week - he averaged 80 kilometres in his TISS days - and doing weights for the first time were just part of the adjustment Leeder had to make in his first few months in Florida.
Leeder will now take two weeks off, come home for Christmas and then return to Florida in January for school and to prepare for the world championships. He won't be running in the indoor track season but will be competing in the NCAA outdoor season.
There were five other local runners in the Canadian championships.
In the junior men's race, Brockville's Jacob Smith placed 46th with Kyle Milks finishing in 55th. John Wyands was 115th with Nick Thomas placing 130th. In junior girls, Brockville's Jenn Wynands was 66th out of 162 competitors.