After every race, Tristan McGuire heads to the nearest Tim Horton’s for a Chocolate Chill.
“This is my treat after a race,” he said.
It’s become a tradition for the young Hawkesbury athlete, marking another challenge for McGuire on his quest to become better and faster than any of his competition in cross-country running.
The 15-year-old 10th grade student at Ecole catholique secondaire regionale de Hawkesbury (ECSRH) has been a competitive runner for three years. It all started with the walks that he and his father, Patrick McGuire, shared each day, a time for the two of them to be together just for the sake of being together.
“It was always our routine,” Tristan said.
The only problem was that McGuire senior moved a bit too slow for McGuire junior.
“We would be walking together,” Patrick McGuire said, with a smile, “but he was always ahead of me. I was holding him back. So, I said one day, ‘Go ahead’, and he just took off!”
And take off, Patrick McGuire did.
“La Baie Run in L’Orignal,” he said. “It was the first race that I did.”
The community fundraiser event was the first taste Maguire, then 13, had of long-distance running as part of a group. He took part in the one-kilometre group and since then, he has kept on running.
He joined the Hawkesbury Roadrunners Athletic Club.
“That’s when he really took off,” said Patrick McGuire.
Over the past three years Tristan has done La Baie Run twice, and also twice taken part in the Alexandria Community Run and entered in The Great Raisin River Race in Williamstown. He’s done the Course du Canal across the Ottawa River in Grenville, Quebec, and also La grande vadrouille in Vaudreuil, le Sentier de l’espoir in Rigaud, the Cours des couleurs in St-Lazare, and le championnats provinciale du Quebec. Tristan has also twice participated in the Valoris run in Embrun.
At ESCRH he is part of the Kodiaks Para and Kodiaks Special Olympics teams. He also is a member of the City of Ottawa Special Olympics team As a child Tristan was diagnosed with autism, a neurological condition that manifests in varying degrees depending on the individual.
As far as Tristan McGuire is concerned, having autism does not make him who he is. Running defines his character, challenging himself to be the best he can be, always testing his limits and striving to exceed them. He’s proven that through his performances for the past two years, representing ESCRH with top three performances at the Eastern Ontario Secondary School Athletics Association (EOSSAA) and the Ontario Federation of Secondary School Athletics Associations (OFSAA) season title events. He took the silver at OFSAA in his category this year, and he plans to go for the gold next year.
“I find it pretty calming,” he said, about how running benefits him. “It gives me a lot of experience in exploring more places to run. I want to keep doing that.”
