HIGH ACHIEVERS: Math professor Diane Guignard race walks to unprecedented numbers in one-hour event

By Martin Cleary

Sports presents itself in many traditional forms, like a regular-season schedule, playoffs, round-robin competition, tournament bracket play and head-to-head matches between countries.

Every so often sport will throw something at us that might make us say: ‘that’s interesting, where did that come from?’

There’s a certain sector of the national and international racewalking, running and cycling communities, for instance, that embrace the idea of having its athletes push their endurance fitness to the max to see how far they can travel in 60 minutes.

Italy’s Filippo Ganna holds the men’s one-hour world record for cycling at 56.304 kilometres, while the women’s global mark of 50.455 kilometres is held by Italian Victoria Bussi, who has a Doctor of Philosophy degree in pure mathematics (hold that thought for a few more paragraphs).

The Canadian records belong to Lionel Sanders at 51.304 kilometres and Angela Goran at 42.547 kilometres.

In running, Great Britain’s Mo Farah and Sifan Hassan of The Netherlands are at the top of the world list at 21.330 kilometres and 18.930 kilometres respectively for a one-hour run. Canada’s best one-hour runners are Thomas Howard at 19.930 kilometres, which he set in 1975, and Rachel Cliff at 16.872 kilometres.

Racewalkers also have their one-hour challenge and the world’s fastest times belong to Pedro Martins of Portugal at 15.908 kilometres and Sandrine Kuster of Switzerland at 14.084 kilometres. The Canadian men’s record belongs to Marek Adamowicz at 13.131 kilometres. Athletics Canada doesn’t show a women’s national record for a one-hour journey.

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Remember the mention of cyclist Bussi in paragraph four. Well, is there a connection between women who love mathematics and are willing push their athletic abilities to the maximum for a full hour? Might just be.

Earlier this month, mathematics professor Diane Guignard of Ottawa produced some unprecedented numbers, when she won the 19th annual Bytown Walkers One-Hour Race on the Terry Fox Athletic Facility track.

The race, which has previously been held inside the Louis-Riel Dome, is believed to be the only one-hour racewalking event in Canada.

And when Guignard isn’t training or competing in the art of race walking, she is an associate math professor in the department of mathematics and statistics at the University of Ottawa.

Both Guignard and Bussi also are similar in age at 38 and 39 respectively.

Competing in her third Bytown Walkers One-Hour Walks event, Guignard was aiming to achieve two specific goals. She wanted to reach 10 kilometres in under 50 minutes and finish her 60-minute challenge in a record time.

Sharing the track with 23 others from Ontario, Quebec, Alberta and the United States, Guignard covered an historic 12.337 kilometres, which is 30 laps around the 400-metre track plus another 337 metres. When the 60-minute walk ended, she dropped a small marking bag on the track to indicate her final step.

Her winning distance eclipsed the previous meet record of 11.891 kilometres, which was set by American international race walker Erin Talcott in 2014. During the one-hour challenge, she also completed her first 10,000 metres at the 48-minute, 17-second mark.

“Continuing her impressive advances in the sport, Diane covered 12,337 metres,” Bytown Walkers head coach Roger Burrows wrote in a press release. “This was a full ‘lap and a bit’ farther than the previous women’s record.

“En route, maintaining an enviable rhythm close to 4:50 per kilometre, Diane passed 10 kilometres (25 laps) in 48:17. This is the first ‘sub-50’ (time) for several years by any Canadian woman other than the current national champion (Olivia Lundman, 48:05.13) in B.C.”

Guignard also reached the five-kilometre mark in 23:52, which came close to her personal best time of 23:35.57 from last month’s prestigious Penn Relays in Philadelphia.

The distance Guignard achieved also was one of the best-ever, if not the best, by a Canadian woman in a one-hour race.

Jean-Francois Tellier of Vainqueurs Plus of Quebec was second in the main event of the Bytown Walkers One-Hour Race Walks with a distance of 11.617 kilometres. Brian O’Donnell of Ontario Racewalkers was third at 11.041 kilometres.

“That’s quite an improvement,” Guignard said in a phone interview, reflecting on her distance and comparing it to her first two Bytown Walkers one-hour events of 10.9 kilometres in 2025 and 9.125 kilometres in 2024. “I was fine (with her performance). I was happy with everything.

“But I don’t know why [I exceeded 12 kilometres]. My speed keeps improving. I had a very good indoor season. I enjoy it and my training improves. I’m getting more and more used to it.”

In March, Guignard won the open and masters 1,500 metres and 3,000 metres at the Canadian indoor masters track and field championships in national record times of 6:45.09 and 13:45.66 respectively. It was the second year in a row she had won both races.

At the Penn State Relays in April, Guignard entered the Olympic Development women’s 5K Racewalk Elite race and placed sixth in a personal-best 23:35.57. Mexican athletes earned all three podium positions and Canadian Rosalie Drapeau was fifth in 23:14.80.

“We sent her specifically so she could race against women faster than her,” Burrows wrote in an email. “It worked. No beating the hotshot Mexicans, but she did well in a good crowd of others. Now, we know she can race as well as just go fast.”

Guignard arrived in Canada five years ago via the United States and her homeland of Switzerland. She started race walking in Ottawa in 2024 and the multi-sport athlete (artistic gymnastics, cross-country skiing, tennis and hiking) had almost instant success.

She seemed to be a natural racewalker as she loves to walk fast in her daily life, but never considered herself as a competitive racewalker. She approached the Bytown Walkers in late 2023 and embraced the sport for the 2024 season.

In 2025, she won the Athletics Ontario 20-kilometre championship, which was held during the fourth Fall Classic Race Walks on a 1,250-metre loop course in Lansdowne Park. Her time of 1:47:36 ranked her third in Canada over 20 kilometres.

She also won three titles at the Canadian outdoor masters championships last year and placed first in the Canadian Track and Field League’s women’s 3,000 metres.

Guignard plans to race her first women’s half-marathon (21.1 kilometres) at the Canadian track and field championships June 17-21 at the Terry Fox Athletic Facility. Her summer schedule also includes the Canadian outdoor masters championships and the world masters championships in Daegu, South Korea, Aug. 22 to Sept. 3.