Home to the oldest race in North America, Around the Bay - 2025 served as the source of the latest racing success for Track North and CAMEL crew veteran Caleb Beland.

The Sudbury native rose to the podium last month, finishing behind only Phil Parrot-Migas (London - 1:37.30) and Sergio Raez Villanueva (Mississauga - 1:39.02) at Around the Bay – 2025.

Covering the 30km course in a time of 1:40.49 (3:21 per km), Beland added another layer to his portfolio that has seen the graduate of both Bishop A Carter CSS and Laurentian University post best ever times in the half-marathon, 10km and 5km distances in the past 12 months.

Now 27 years old and having completed his schooling, Beland and coach Darren Jermyn are navigating the realities of his hectic schedule as a chiropractor, all while learning what works best for the young man who is preparing to tackle the Sporting Life 10km on May 11th in Toronto.

“Mileage-wise, I wasn’t running a ton because we were focused on having me feeling fresh through the entire build,” said Beland, who now resides in Burlington but works in Milton. “In the past, I’ve been guilty of burning out almost every season.”

“We focused on more quality vs quantity this year.”

His proximity to the 30km course that essentially contours the Hamilton Harbour allowed Beland to bypass the feeling of being a race newcomer despite tackling this distance for the very first time, in a race setting, last Sunday.

“My long runs were typically around the course,” he said. “I wanted to make sure I felt comfortable on the course and specifically the more challenging parts of the course.”

Not that this training necessarily prepared him for everything he would encounter on race day.

With several distances being run that day, organizers decided to allow the 15km and 10km fields to essentially bring it home, with one and all travelling on the same route towards the exact same finish line.

“What ended up happening is that I was running into a bunch of runners that were running other races, because of the pace I was running at,” stated Beland. “The last five km, I was people dodging, going wide on corners.”

“That was one thing I really did not prepare for.”

Not that he was losing any sleep over the issue as we chatted just days following the race.

“Considering this was my first attempt at this distance and the conditions weren’t ideal, I don’t think realistically I could have asked for more.”