Manitoba Marathon head says communication came up short after race cancelled

The head of the Manitoba Marathon doesn't regret starting a race her team soon cancelled because of the unforgiving temperatures, but she admits race officials could have done a better job communicating the closure. 

Once the race was officially called off roughly 75 minutes after it began on Sunday, Rachel Munday, the marathon's executive director, said officials made a point of telling runners they could keep competing if they chose. 

That message encouraged some runners to press forward, when perhaps they shouldn't have, Munday said.

"If it ever happened again we wouldn't use the words, 'If you continue, you run at your own risk,'" she said. "People think at that point there's an option."

The messaging seemingly added to the confusion runners felt on Sunday when the plug was pulled on the 44th annual running of the Manitoba Marathon, owing to sizzling temperatures that broke weather records in Winnipeg — and the forecast saw coming.

Some runners say they were perplexed by the cancellation and the differing messages they were hearing. 

"Everybody was doing their own thing," said Geoff Richardson, a Winnipeg educator who ran in his first marathon on Sunday. 

"We had volunteers saying, 'Stop, the course is closed. You have to stop.' And then other volunteers saying, 'Great job. Keep going. You're doing great.' It was a 180-degree difference between the messaging."

Richardson was a third of the way through the race when a police officer told him the race was closed. Unclear what the cop meant and desperate for more information, he and the other runners nearby kept going. His own concerns were settled when a race official said his race time was no longer being recorded but he didn't have to pull out of the race.

Later on, he was urged to quit by a volunteer who claimed, incorrectly, there were no more water stations ahead. 

"I've been training for so long I didn't want to stop. I decided to keep running until either I finished the race or the transport bus came to pick me up and we were literally told to stop." 

Munday explained the Manitoba Marathon team wasn't about to put up roadblocks, literally or figuratively. 

"You could say, 'The course is closed, you need to get on the bus,' but you still can't make them get on the bus," she said.

Munday said buses were coming back without any runners.