By David Monti, @d9monti
(c) 2026 Race Results Weekly, all rights reserved
OTTAWA (22-May) — When Florence Caron entered Penn State University in the fall of 2023, a transfer student from Universite Laval in her native Quebec, she was a miler. But after finishing 11th at both the Big Ten Cross Country Championships and Mid-Atlantic Regional Championships, she and her coaches thought that maybe she was destined for success at longer distances.
They were right.
The following year she won the Big Ten Conference titles at both 5000m and 10,000m, finished 14th in the 10,000m at the NCAA Championships, and finished 19th at the NCAA Cross Country Championships in the fall. The die was cast.
“I was recruited as a miler,” Caron told Race Results Weekly in an interview here today, one day ahead of Saturday’s Athletics Canada 10-K Championships hosted by the Ottawa 10-K presented by Otto’s Ottawa. “We actually figured out that I was actually pretty OK at distance. We just threw in the 10-K to try to make points at the Big Ten and I just won it. We just realized that distance was my calling.”
Caron, 25, who now lives and trains in Flagstaff, Ariz., became one of Penn State’s most successful distance athletes. In a program that emphasizes 800-meter running, Caron got the best of both speed and endurance training. In 2025 she took 11th at the NCAA Championships in the 10,000m and took her personal best down to 32:23.71. That set the stage for starting her professional career with Hoka Northern Arizona Elite under head coach Jack Mullaney, a program that emphasizes road running in general and marathon running in particular. She really feels at home there.
“It’s a really big change from college running,” Caron explained. “But it’s been good. I moved, I switched coach, I switched teammates, but like the last month and a half I really started to figure it out and have fun. All of the pressure I was putting on myself going as a pro, you want everything to be perfect because it’s your job now and your passion. And I was like, I just need to take a step back, keep having fun with it if I want to have a long career.”
Even before moving to Flagstaff to join her professional team, Caron took a try at the half-marathon distance the summer before her senior year at Penn State. She ran a very solid 1:11:57 at the Athletics Canada Half-Marathon Championships last August in Edmonton. She returned to school for her final cross country season, then competed at the Canadian Cross Country Championships last November where she finished third. That qualified her for the World Athletics Cross Country Championships last January in Tallahassee, her first international championships for Canada. Racing in Hoka shoes for the first time as a pro, she finished 57th in a field of 90.
“I was already really liking the brand,” Caron said of Hoka. “I was running in Hokas for my whole running career, basically, so that was already a plus. Also, I was really liking the coaching, a great mix of science and art. I feel like as an individual you need to feel good about trusting your coach because it’s an important part of my life. Flagstaff is like the running Mecca, anyway.”
For tomorrow, Caron will be making her 10-K road running debut in her Hoka Cielo racing shoes. Interestingly, her last two races were a 1:11:49 half-marathon in March in Upstate New York, and a 15:33 5-K in Quebec earlier this month. She’s excited to test her blend of speed and endurance training here tomorrow. Her husband is Olivier Desmeules, a 1:46 800-meter runner who also competed for Penn State. He’s been helping her with her speed workouts.
“My husband is an 800 runner,” she said. “He’s kind of retired, but I get him to pace me in workouts. I obviously do threshold stuff and long runs, but one of my workouts is faster. I’ve been surprised. I feel like I’ve kept my speed from my miler’s day. In workouts I’m like, oh, I can still do those times.”
The ratified Canadian 10-K record of 31:44 was set by Lynn Williams back in 1989 (Caron was born 11 years later). That mark is just a little faster than Lanni Marchant’s Ottawa 10-K Canadian course record of 31:48 from 2015. Caron could certainly attack those records, although she said that competing well against key rivals like Cleo Boyd, Erin Mawhinney, and Lilly Tuck was more important. Reigning champion Gracelyn Larkin is not competing.
“I don’t know because this is like my first 10-K on the roads,” said Caron when asked about prospects in tomorrow’s race. “I just want to do well at the distance.” She added: “If I feel good I’m just like going to go. I love to run fast. I’m not scared to run alone if I have to.”
Caron hopes to move up to the marathon in the fall. That’s a huge leap for an athlete who was focused on the mile just three years ago. She said she’s anxious to test herself at the distance.
“I respect the distance a lot,” she said. “It’s a hard race, and I want to do it in the long-term. I feel like I want to do it to see what it is and how my body reacts to it. From there, obviously, I’d like to do a good time.”
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The Athletics Canada 10-K Championships will be held on Saturday. The elite women begin at 5:45 p.m., and the elite men will go at 6:00 p.m. Prize money will be paid ten-deep starting at CAD 6000 and going down to CAD 100 for tenth place. There is also a CAD 1000 bonus for a new Canadian record.
The race will be streamed LIVE and FREE via the Run Ottawa Youtube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAqD3HC83yA
PHOTO: Florence Caron competing in the 2026 World Athletics Cross Country Championships (photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)
PHOTO: Florence Caron in advance of the 2026 Ottawa 10-K presented by Otto’s Ottawa (photo by Jane Monti for Race Results Weekly)
ENDS
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