Five times might be a charm for mountain racer

CINTHIA RITCHIE

July 03, 2008 at 1:42PM AKST

Cedar Bourgeois has never run a road race.

She’s never worked out in a gym or set foot on a treadmill either.

Yet the 32-year-old single mother has managed to win the past four Mount Marathon races, with a top time of 51:44 in 2005.

“It’s not the running per say I love,” she says. “It’s being in the mountains and woods.”

She started running after graduating from high school, when she joined a hiking group with friends.

“All that time I was in school, I was basically doing indoor sports,” she said. “I ignored the trails.”

Climbing up elevation in the outdoor air, she soon understood, was where she wanted to be. She ran her first Mount Marathon race in 1997 and placed a surprising third.

She then got sidetracked with marriage and two children; she didn’t return to the race until 2002.

It wasn’t the best run of her career. Training with young children proved challenging, and she devised ways to include daughter Coral, now 7, and son Zen, 8, in winter ski sessions (sled) and summer bike rides (carts).

Her diligence paid off, and she placed third in 2002 and second in 2003.

“I’ve made running fit into my schedule,” she says. “I make it happen. When it gets close to racing, I become a little crazy mom.”

She credits family, friends and her ex-husband with helping to free up training time.

“I still feel guilty about spending so much time and energy running,” she says. “I’ve heard negative comments about it.”

She hopes her children use her dedication as an example to follow their own passions.

“I want my daughter to see me as a strong woman,” she says. “I hope she knows that she can make whatever she wants happen.”

And Bourgeois has made it happen, fitting hikes, runs, cross-country ski sessions and biking around children and work responsibilities. She’s presently the only female line-cook at Rae’s Waterfront Restaurant, where she shucks oysters and takes care of salads and deserts.

“The mountain running really helps this job because I feel like I keep calm under pressure and have the stamina to keep up when it gets crazy,” she says.

She isn’t sure why she wins — she doesn’t believe in natural talent.

“It’s being out there all the time, in every single condition. I train year round. I never stop,” she says. “It’s the thing I do for myself. It keeps me sane. It’s my medicine.”

It’s also a lack of fear.

“Some people won’t run out there with the bears alone,” she says. “Of course I know they’re out there, but I don’t worry about them.”

She runs with a Labrador retriever named Ital she adopted from the shelter. The name is a Jamaican term meaning pure life and living, she explains.

This year she’s had a tough time gearing up for race mode.

“It was snowing in June up there, and I was mad at the mountain and not in a good mood,” she says.

She didn’t run the Bird Ridge mountain race this year, normally her second-strongest event.

“I keep wanting to pull something out of myself that I haven’t yet,” she says. “I’ve love to run a race when I’m not saving something.”

This year the snow cover should make for a fast downhill, Bourgeois’ strongest part of the race. She hoping to hit beat her 51:44 best from 2005.

“I hate for it to be all about winning, but oh, this mountain is so special to me,” she says.

It’s more than training or racing times. Heading up that mountain is a spiritual journey for Bourgeois.

“Just being out there and seeing that beauty is enough,” she says. “Sometimes I’m blown away running through those trails.”

Cinthia Ritchie can be reached at (907) 342-2428 or toll free at (800) 770-9830, ext. 428.