Jerome Blake breaks national championship meet record to win men’s 200 title

OTTAWA — Jerome Blake broke the Canadian track and field championship record running 19.95 seconds to win the men’s 200-metre title on Sunday.

The previous meet record was held by Brendon Rodney — Blake’s teammate on Canada’s Olympic champion 4×100 men’s relay team — who ran 19.96 in 2016. The time was also a personal best for Blake, who turns 30 on Aug. 18.

Toronto’s Aaron Brown (20.08), also a teammate of Blake’s on the relay team, and Ottawa’s Eliezer Adjibi (20.60) finished second and third, respectively.

Blake, from Kelowna, B.C., and Brown both met the 200 qualifying standard time (20.16) for the upcoming world championships in Tokyo in September.

Blake also has the standard in the 100, having ran a personal-best time of 9.97 seconds on June 21 at a meet in Germany.

He did not compete in the 100 final on Friday due to being disqualified for a false start in the semifinals.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 3, 2025.