Whitehorse Daily Star

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Photo by Dan Davidson

SATURDAY MORNING GRIND – Ray Sabo leads a group up the Midnight Dome in Dawson City Saturday.

Waterreus grinds out Dome victory in Dawson

Saturday’s gut-wrenching Midnight Dome Race was won by a man in a kilt.

By Dan Davidson on July 27, 2015

DAWSON CITY – Saturday’s gut-wrenching Midnight Dome Race was won by a man in a kilt.

Stephen Waterreus, 50, led the pack of runners up the mountain in the annual race, taking first place overall with a time of 38:05.

The masters runner is no stranger to winning the 7.2-kilometre event, which occurs on the same weekend as the Dawson City Music Festival. He won four in a row from 2008 to 2011.

This time, he was rewarded with a flight courtesy of Air North, the race’s major sponsor.

Air North spokesperson Christopher Griffiths said four flights were handed out in total – to the top runners and walkers of both genders.

Waterreus was followed by Jeff Irwin, another masters runner from Orillia, Ont., (38:46), and then by 14-year-old Jack Amos of Dawson City (39:29).

Catherine Lamarche of Dawson was the fastest female runner, with a time of 43:31.

But Waterreus wasn’t actually the first person to climb that final slope to the finish line.

That was masters female Jane Vincent of Whitehorse, with a time of 1:00.27.

Walkers start half an hour ahead of the runners, and several of them were in ahead of everyone else, including 14-year-old Teresa Procee of Dawson who was the second walker to arrive just over five minutes behind Vincent.

The two groups set off from just in front of the Palace Grand Theatre on a fine Saturday morning, with the runners heading up King Street at about 10 a.m.

The good weather, with a slight breeze to keep the bugs away, continued all the way up the hill to the Dome itself, where it was sunny and warm enough that people staffing the finish line found they were shedding some layers.

Altogether there were 56 runners and 12 walkers this year.

Race organizers wished to thank Air North, the Canadian Rangers and Junior Rangers, and all of the event’s volunteers.

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