On May 30th I lined up for the 3rd annual Fraser Street Beer Mile. It would be my 5th ever beer mile, and ended with my first podium finish in a race, ever.

What Is a Beer Mile?

A beer mile is a footrace, typically run around a track, with one gimmick: competitors must drink a beer before each lap of the track, completing 4 beers and 4 laps by the end of the race.

The race goes like this: competitors line up, beer in hand. The beer is a choice left to the competitor, but it must be at least 5.0% alcohol, and it must be at least 355ml (can or bottle). At the gun, competitors open their first beers and start moving. They must finish their beer before exiting a short “transition area”. Upon finishing, they can start their first lap. Once the lap is finished, they grab a second beer, and the process repeats for 4 laps in total.

Running and drinking is hard, but the real challenge is in keeping the beers down. Competitors must drink their entire beer, and if you throw up at any point during the race, the penalty is running an extra lap. In trying to drink the beers as quickly as possible, the beer tends to foam, and you’ve really got to focus on not letting it bubble its way back up your throat.

The current world record? As of writing, it’s held by Corey Bellemore, who ran a blistering 4:27 beer mile. If you want to know more, there’s a set of official rules and more results at beermile.com.

My History as a Beer Miler

2019, Running My First OCRC Beer Mile

I ran my first beer mile in 2019, hosted by the Ottawa City Run Club, at a tiny residential track in the suburbs of Ottawa. The run club would host interesting little races like this from time to time, and it was the first time I had heard of the beer mile. I signed up, just hoping to have fun with it, have a few beers with friends, and try something new.

The race ended up going…. alright. My primary goal was to just not throw up, and I did at least accomplish that! But it was certainly close. The way the foam creeps up your throat is hard to describe, but it really does feel like it’s going to force its way out.

I ended up finishing in 11:51, my beer drinking and laps getting slower and slower over the course of the race. The race wasn’t officially timed in any way, but I’ve got my results on Strava.

2024, The Renegade Mile, and an Invite to the Vancouver Beer Mile

In 2024, I discovered my favourite Vancouver run club, the East Van Run Crew, hosted their own beer mile. Unfortunately, I discovered this, along with some friends, just slightly too late — the race had already sold out. But, undeterred, we decided to run our own beer mile an hour before they had scheduled to run theirs, at a nearby track.

Turns out, we had actually ended up at the same track the Vancouver Beer Mile was planning to run at, and they offered to time our race for us. We lined up, and I was running my 2nd ever beer mile.

The race went well, I PR’d by quite a bit, finishing in 7:45, keeping the beers down, and pushing through the runs quite a bit faster. In this attempt, somehow almost every lap was faster than my fastest lap in 2019. From a fastest lap time of 2:02 in 2019, to a slowest lap time of 2:15 according to Strava.

So impressed by our ambition, Cory, race director of the Vancouver Beer Mile, invited us to compete in the subsequent official race, just 45 minutes later. Not one to back down from a challenge, I decided I’d go for a second round, and my 3rd ever beer mile.

You’d think 2 beer miles in a row would be hard, but there really wasn’t much to the 2nd one. The first 4 beers had nearly an hour to settle, and I had definitely begun to feel them. It almost made the running easier, to be a little tipsy… almost.

In the end, I followed up my 7:45 beer mile with an 8:10 beer mile. I do recall being absolutely goofy that evening, having 8 beers in just over an hour.

2025, The Vancouver Beer Mile, and Becoming Delusional About the Podium

In 2025, I came back to the Vancouver Beer Mile, having successfully registered for a spot in advance, and I was really starting to have some confidence in my beer-mile-running ability. I had only ever really paid attention to my friends, but I knew at that point I had become the fastest beer miler among them. In the lead up to that race I really started thinking a bit more about not just doing well against my previous attempts, but doing well in the race overall.

I had settled on a couple beers that sat well in my stomach and felt I could confidently keep down, I was generally a fast runner, faster than I had been at almost any other point in my life. I felt locked in.

The race itself is a blur. I remember friends cheering me on, I remember the feeling of the foam travelling up my throat, I remember trying to catch my breath before starting to chug the next beer. While this one’s on Strava, it’s also on Sportstats. Those told a clear picture: I was a fast runner, but a slow drinker. On average, I was running ~1:16 laps, and spending ~33 seconds per beer. The winner? ~1:12 laps, but just ~17 seconds. That was a huge gap. However, the podium wasn’t so far off. 3rd place was running ~1:21 laps (slower than me), but finishing his beers in ~15 seconds (much, much faster than me). I figured maybe I had a bit more in my legs, but I knew I had a lot more in my drinks.

2026, Putting It All Together at the Fraser Street Beer Mile

In 2026, the Vancouver Beer Mile organizers took a step back, and the Fraser Street Beer Mile took over. Costumes highly encouraged, I donned my Spider-Man suit once more. This year I was hoping to take up to a minute off my time, knowing I could drink the beers much faster than I had been in the past, and hoping to sneak my way onto my first podium.

At this point in my illustrious career as a beer miler I was confident I could keep the beers down while running. Once I finished a drink, got moving, and got the first couple burps out, the rest was easy. Stay cool, stay fast, don’t lose the leaders.

I started out in 6th place, finishing my first beer in 14 seconds, and heading out on the first lap around the track. Starting out in 6th had me slightly worried, but I felt confident I could get the next 3 beers down with some consistency, that I hoped the other racers wouldn’t be able to muster. I finished the first lap in 1:19, not my fastest, but I knew holding back just a touch was going to help with the beers.

For the 2nd beer, I did my best to get it down in one breath. In my opinion, that is what makes or breaks a strong beer mile. You finish a lap, it’s just shy of an all-out sprint, you’re gasping for air, and now you’ve got to hold your breath while you put back a beer so it doesn’t go down the wrong pipe. If you stop now, you’ll have to catch your breath again, and it’s only going to take longer. Hold your breath, suck the beer back, and get back to running as quickly as possible.

The 2nd beer ended up taking me 22 seconds, and I headed out, 8 seconds under my time at this point from 2025. I left the transition zone in 2nd place by just a second or two, but over the course of the next 200m I closed that gap. I lost a few seconds on the lap, leaving me just 3 seconds under my time from 2025, but in first place overall!

The 3rd beer went down surprisingly smoothly, but just a bit more slowly. I did end up having to pause and catch my breath a second time, and finished this beer in 26 seconds. However, that put me well under the 40 seconds it had taken me in 2025, and I headed out on the 3rd lap, still firmly in first place.

On the 4th lap, I, once again, stopped to catch my breath, but still put the beer back in just 27 seconds, giving me, to this point, a ~35 second lead over my 2025 result. I headed out on the last lap in 1st place, unbeknownst to me that 2nd place would kick that last lap, leaving on their 4th lap 10 seconds behind me, and finishing just 1 second behind me.

In the end, I’d finish the Fraser Street Beer Mile in 6:45, a 35 second PR over my 2025 beer mile, and in first place overall! For the first time in my life, I had not only finished on the podium, but had actually won the race! I was a bit in shock, that I had held myself together and legged out a win.

The full results of the race are on Sportstats and my own Strava activity is here.

What’s up Next?

The 2026 edition of the Fraser Street Beer Mile won’t be my last. I know there’s still so much room for improvement. There’s a huge gap between my average ~22 seconds per beer, and the elite beer drinking times of ~6–8 seconds. My laps are quick, but they could be quicker. The past couple years my focus has been on longer (much longer) races, but I’ve been thinking about stepping back from focusing on ultramarathons as my A-races each year, and diving back into the world of road racing. My eventual goal is to run a sub-6:00 beer mile. With a focus on speed and drinking, I think there’s plenty of space to find those ~45 seconds of improvement.

For now though, I’ve got my next couple races to focus on, and my wedding in the very near future.

But I’ll be back to take on the Beer Mile once more, in due time.