Mia Larochelle, new comet in Quebec running

Seven months ago, Mia Larochelle was a young soccer player bored by injuries in a university in Louisiana. Here is now one of the best runners in Quebec. On the athletics track of Laval University, a new comet was born.

With each training we do together, she needs supervision because she does not know the lines of arrival and departure on the track of 400 metersdescribes Jade Bérubé about his training partner, this summer, in the group of the famous coach Félix-Antoine Lapointe.

Aged 27, Bérubé competes in running since childhood and she regularly rubbed shoulders with the best runners in the country in recent years.

By her side, Mia Larochelle has only been training athletics since January, but here she is already 5 km provincial champion and medalist of the Canadian University Championships.

At the end of the last training we did together, it was really intense and I said to myself: “Cassin, Mia is therefore good”. And there, I saw that she had jogging shoes in the feet when we all had [souliers d’athlétisme à crampons]. It’s not fairlaunches laughing Jade Bérubé.

From soccer to athletics

Out of nowhere on the Quebec running stage, Mia Larochelle was rather known in the world of soccer until last winter.

Younger, I did cheerleadingdance, skiing, tennis, but every summer I returned to play soccertells the one who notably worn the colors of the Enlans of Cégep Garneau between 2021 and 2023.

Recruited by the colonels of Nicholls State University at the end of his collegial career, the attacker never saw the field during his only season in Louisiana last fall. Already annoyed by a knee injury when she arrived on the Campus de Thibodeaux, she quickly found herself on the tile with a severe bursitis.

It was during her convalescence, when she was limited to jogging, that she taste in running. The coach of track Always saw me running on campus. She said to herself: “Who is the blonde who runs all the time” and she offered to join the teamsays Mia Larochelle.

The idea of ​​abandoning the round ball to explore her runner potential he liked, but the Quebecer decided to go home to do so. From there, the successes were instantaneous.

Already used to podiums

Only one training was enough for Sylvain Légaré, the Rouge et Or head coach from Laval University to decide to make a place in Mia Larochelle in his athletics team last January. A month later, the 20 -year -old athlete won his very first university provincial race, a 3000 m, nine seconds in front of his closest rival.

Yes, I was surprised. It’s been a long time since I was running to train and I thought I could improve myself, but I didn’t know how much I had talent admits the runner green.

In March, still in the 3000 m, she deserved the bronze medal of the Canadian University Championships. In May, 5 kilometers from the runner clinic, she styled one of the best background runners in the country, Anne-Marie Comeau, to get her hands on the title of Quebec champion.

Barely a few months after starting to train seriously, Larochelle is far from being full.

I am still lasting for myself and I look at girls who have been running for a long time and who have exceptional timesshe points out from the tac to the tac.

Yes, it’s good what I do, but it’s nothing if I want to go to the Olympic Games one day. I have crusts to eat.

This clever mixture of talent, ambition and naivety is the strength of Mia Larochelle, believes her training partner, Jade Bérubé. Me, it’s been a long time since I run and, want, not, over time, we can impose limits. For Mia, everything is new and there is no limit.

An Olympic dream that will go through Colorado

Nevertheless, there are few runners who talk about the Olympic Games as a goal just a few months after their first competition. Mia Larochelle knows that the road is still long, but it does not hesitate to aim high.

It’s fun because I have victories and it looks like it pushes me. I see it as steps to go. Ok, that’s it, what is the next step?

It is in this spirit that the former attacker of the Royal Beauport recently accepted a scholarship of the University of Colorado, she who did not plan to return to the United States at all.

It was his boyfriend’s agent, a professional hockey, who passed the word about him south of the border. Several the biggest sports programs in the NCAA were in court overnight.

The current went particularly well with the Colorado Buffaloese coach, who also enjoy the advantage of altitude. In the bond and half -land, training at more than 1000 m above sea level is an advantage.

It was not planned, but the University of Colorado made me an offer that arrives once in a lifetime. Unlike Louisiana, where I left a little back, there, I know that I will be there for a bit.

There is no doubt that it is possible to reach the Olympic Games by staying in Quebec training under the aegis of Félix-Antoine Lapointe, specifies Mia Larochelle. Charles Philibert-Thiboutot, Jean-Simon Desgagnés and Thomas Fafard are living evidence.

But the new comet of the Quebec semi-stay race believes that facing stronger runners in the American university network will help him reach her full potential.

I can’t wait to be there, but if they were not people here in Quebec, I wouldn’t be where I am in athletics. I’m really going to bother my world.

With the information of Jean-Philippe Martin