As she approaches from the distance, you see a square silhouette move up and down, arms pumping forward, legs straight, short hair bobbing in the wind. She approaches with determination, no one else in sight. She crosses the finish line, and readily greets the press with a warm smile.

Nathalie Côté has just won a 10 K race in Ottawa, the Run for Lunch, in support of providing food for students at the University of Ottawa, Nathalie's alma mater. Nathalie was asked to participate and promote the race with John Halvorsen, former Olympian and Ottawa U. graduate. She gladly accepts, runs the race, sticks around for the awards ceremony to pick up her award and also provides a brief speech to praise the race organizers and volunteers. Her job done, she still has to remember to have her picture taken with the top 3 women so that her sponsor, PowerBar, is made aware of her accomplishment that day.

With a cordial demeanour, she accepts to answer questions about herself. Her running interest started in high school in Rockland, ON, where she was involved in various sports such as soccer. Someone introduced her to the track, she loved it and running has been her passion for the past 10 years.

At 26, Nathalie has a wide breath of experience with running and with geography. She moved to Ottawa while still in high school and started training with her coach Ray Elrick. After high school, she was convinced by a few girls she met at the 1993 Canada Games to join them at the University of Wisconsin. Though she was a bit uncertain about such a drastic move, she did join the girls and ran for Wisconsin for 2 years. After that, she travelled to California at UCLA where she ran for a couple of months.

Nathalie on her way to winning the Ottawa Xerox 10K

The system that Nathalie encountered in the US did not suit her style. The American College track atmosphere is quite intense. The coach's philosophy was to push the workouts and make them almost a daily race. Nathalie realised that as for most athletes, physical and mental recovery is needed and would ultimately benefit her. Being slightly fed up with the focus of the American Colleges, she decided to return to her native grounds and started her studies at the University of Ottawa. At that time, running was not on her mind as she felt a little burnt out. She even considered giving up on running, but only for a couple of hours. Though her motivation had been affected, her love of running slowly brought her back to the sport.

Today Nathalie has her sites on what most athletes can only dream of, the Olympics. They are just outside her grasp. She is so focus on qualifying and representing Canada in Australia that her e-mail ID is "Sydney2000". In order to progress towards her goal of running the 1500m in Sydney, she has to achieve two objectives: 1) run the qualifying time of 4:08 for the 1500m, and 2) be one of the top 3 in Canada. Presently, her PB at the 1500m is 4:12:68.

On her way to meeting her goals, she will have to put away any valleys aside and climb the peaks of performance. Nathalie considers that the past year has been poor for her. As she was completing her Teacher's Certificate, she was travelling from where she lived to the university, sometimes spending 2-3 hours on the roads. Combined with the high university workload, she became tired and sick more than once. She lost a lot of confidence in herself. Even though she represented Canada at the World University Games in Spain in July, she was not happy with her performance as she did not make the finals. After that, she started relaxing and cut back on her racing. That old running spirit came back.

Presently, she has a few races in mind before focusing on making the Olympic Team. Nathalie enjoys cross-country running tremendously as it gives her a sense of freedom as she runs. She has been crowned 3 times CIAU cross-country champion. She plans on running in the Canadian cross-country Championships in Etobicoke on November 18, though she finds the new 8K course a little far from her 1500 m speciality. Even though she might earn a spot on the Canadian Cross-country 8K Team going to the World Championship next year, she would only consider competing in the 4 K event at the Worlds in Portugal.

Following the cross-country season, Nathalie will be settling in her new part-time teaching position and concentrating on bringing her performance to new heights. She will be training with a few Ottawa athletes, Sarah Dillabaugh, Chris MacGregor and Scott MacDonald. She has no illusion though that hard work will be required. In preparation, she expects to run weeks of 80, 100 and 120 km based on a 3 week cycle. She would be training possibly twice a day. Her week would incorporate 3 interval sessions and 2 tempo runs. Nathalie Côté will use whatever means she has to reach her objectives: she runs on the track, does cross-country running, has invested in a treadmill that can reach 12 mph for those awful Ottawa winter days. Her stopwatch is her best friend as it assists her to work on her pacing.

All this hard work to achieve such a desirable goal comes with many sacrifices. You realise her dedication when you reach her answering machine that says: "I'm not home right now, probably out training." She is also attracting attention and sponsors by making herself available for speaking engagements and organizing fund raising events such as a golf tournament. She also gets some financial support from her family, especially her father and brother. Only recently has her family started to realise Nathalie's passion and talent. Seldom did she have her parents watch her race as she was progressing, but this will change dramatically once she represents Canada at the Olympics.

One person that has always been behind Nathalie is her coach Ray Elrick. He started supporting her when she was 16 and still coaches her today. When Nathalie came back from the US and joined the University of Ottawa, she was not just part of the female track team, she was the female track team. Ray, as coach of the men's team, was able to divert some funds to ensure Nathalie represented Ottawa U. at various events. She did that wonderfully, claiming many titles along the 3 years at Ottawa U. These include 4 track titles: two at the 1500m, one at 3000m and one at 1000m.

Though Nathalie has won races on the roads, on the track and in cross-country, a few events stick out in her mind as most memorable. She was quite proud and happy when she made the Junior National Cross-country team in Halifax in November 1990. She also fondly remembers her first cross-country CIAU title when she won over Sarah Dillabaugh. This was sort of a turning point as it brought her level of confidence to a higher level. Just last year, in 1998, she barely missed qualifying for the Commonwealth Games when she placed 4^th in the 1500 m at the Canadian Championship with a PB of 4:12:68. She was particularly excited about her results as she placed ahead of Kathy Butler, a long time rival who has been racing at the international level for a few years now.

With those major accomplishments in her bag of experience, she can build for the future. The near future involves the 1500m, but after the Olympics, there might be some dabbling into the 5000m. She presently has times of 2:05.19 for the 800m, 4:12.68 for the 1500m, 4:37 in the mile, 16:28 for a 5K road race and 16:34 for a track 5000m. Her 10K road best was in 1996 at the Nordion 10K in Ottawa when she finished in 33:32. Beyond the 5000m, Nathalie finds it a but long mentally. Physically, her performances show she has the endurance.

On the road to Sydney, Nathalie Côté does not think of running heroes. Since she wants to be at the same level as the other runners, she does not really look up to any runner, though she still considers someone like Michael Jordan a person to emulate as he has reached the epitome of his sport.

Young, motivated, congenial, open, bright, dedicated, Nathalie has the ingredients to reach the upper echelons of our sport. As she declares, "Running is simple. There is no secret. You need to train. That's all it is. Talent will get you only so far. Discipline and perseverance will get you further."

Female

Male

1. Danuta Bartoszek

1:15:19

Godfrey Kiprotich (KEN)

1:02:54

2. Jackie Mota

1:15:42

Joseph Kibor

1:03:00

3. Isabelle Ledroit

1:15:58

James Bungei

1:03:06

4. Leslie Carson

1:16:02

Joseph Ndiritu

1:03:13

5. Tania Jones

1:16:11

Julius Gwako

1:03:34

6. Michelle King

1:16:26

Joseph Maina

1:05:58

7. Veronique Vandermissen

1:17:11

Bruce Deacon

1:07:14

8. Kimberley Webb

1:18:04

John Cress

1:08:18

9. Lois Medal

1:20:35

Rob Kirby

1:08:25

10. Laura Konantz

1:22:49

Nick Tsioros

1:08:29

Masters

Masters

1. Lois Medal

1:20:35

Amit Ne'Eman (Israel)

1:09:15

2. Laura Konantz

1:22:49

Mike Dyon

1:09:25

3. Patricia Stevenson

1:26:07

Jerry Kooymans

1:13:41

Female

Male

1. Cindy Rhodes

2:52:49

Bruce Deacon

2:26:23

2. Julie Heidt

2:58:17

Kelvin Broad

2:27:09

3. Stephanie Owen

2:59:07

Brendan Brazier

2:29:35

4. Sonja Frank

3:02:34

Dave Matte

2:32:32

5. Marguerite Masson

3:04:52

Anthony Skuce

2:33:31

Masters

Masters

1. Cindy Rhodes

2:52:49

Vince Cole

2:38:59

Female

Male

1. Judith Leroy

28:09

James Davidson

24:59

2. Ulla Marquette

28:27

Craig Odermatt

25:23

3. Gwyn Woodson

30:38

Simon Dejongh

25:27

4. Carla Escobar

30:56

Richard Lee

25:38

5. Catherine Gill

31:26

Ken Bell

25:49

Male

Female

1. Manuel Salvati

2:28:24

Allison McKenzie

2:59:50

2. Scott Vining

2:32:21

Martie Dunning

3:02:30

3. Kent Hollingsworth

2:32:51

Marie Decker

3:03:49

4. Mark Coughlin

2:35:13

Leslis Gold

3:07:23

5. Dan Major

2:38:44

Sarah Wiley

3:08:27

Masters

Masters

1. Joseph Allegretti

2:42:47

Marie Decker

3:03:49

Male

Female

1. John Waigwa (KEN)

1:09:36

Cindy New (40+)

1:21:59

2. Kimmo Ahonen

1:11:32

Denise Muir

1:23:57

3. Vasile Nlkoraev (40+)

1:12:36

Marianne Bealkowski

1:25:42

1.

Stephane Gamache

25:40

Nancy Norman

30:44

2.

Berry De Bruijn

26:15

Noeleen Wadden

31:10

3.

Rick Hellard

26:25

Angela Plamondon

31:17

1.

Don Bambury

2:36:27

Natalie Butler

2:56:11

2.

James Gardner

2:37:34

Rene McKibbin

3:06:27

3.

Dave Cwynar

2:43:26

Petra Graen

3:12:03

40+

William Robertson

2:44:41

Nancy Hamilton

3:13:04