When he isn’t busy ensuring Bracebridge’s pearly white smiles, Ken Hawthorn is leaving his mark on trails all over the world.

A former member with the Canadian junior and senior national cross-country ski teams, Hawthorn left the sport for several years to raise a family and start a dental practice in Bracebridge.

By 40 he knew it was time to return to the sport he fell in love with. He has since been a regular competitor on the world stage at the annual Masters World Cup and in races across the country.

With two daughters, Rachelle and Natalia, and a dental practice, it is amazing Hawthorn can get everything accomplished, but with a passion and love for training the results have come.

“I enjoy the sport, enjoy the training, being out in nature, the camaraderie and when you race you want to feel you did the very best on the day,” he said. “There are all kinds of little things. You just have to put those things behind you and do the best you can each time.”

Depending on his next race, his training regimen varies from distance to interval training. Most would see the training as a have-to thing, but for him it’s a want-to.

“When you have a goal for yourself that you set, that gets you out the door to train,” he said. “I have a passion for it. I enjoy the activity.”

His favourite place to train year-round is the Bracebridge Resource Management Centre.

Last year he had his best finish at the Masters World Cup in Rovaniemi, Finland, completing 45 kilometres in 2:14:24:3 for 12th place.

Besides the World Masters championship races, where he competes in the 40- to 49-year-old group in the Classic 30-km and Classic 45-km categories, he can usually be found in the open class battling with the young guys in several races a year such as the Muskoka Loppet, hosted at Arrowhead Provincial Park, where he has won and most recently came second to friend Glen Meuswisser.

“I like to compete against the fastest people around. That keeps you going too, I enjoy the endurance,” said Hawthorn. The hardest part of any race distance, he added, comes after the three-quarter-way mark. “The last quarter is the hard part. It doesn’t matter if it is a short race or a long race.”

His preference has always been the long distances where he feels most comfortable.

Much of the draw toward competition for him is the camaraderie he shares with other competitors, many of whom he knows from his earlier racing days.

“There are two things: I enjoy the people I ski with and people love certain sports or certain activities. When you find the one you like, you couldn’t think of not sticking with it,” he said.

Now that he is close to 50, he is excited about the future.

“I thought I would give it a shot for five years to have some fun and decided to keep on going,” he said.

Hawthorn said his adjustment to the high calibre of competition took about two years before he regained the same feel he had as an Olympic hopeful in the late 1970s.

Only a few years into his return he achieved one of his greatest accomplishments by taking 11th place in the 50-km open category race at the Canadian championships in Valcartier, Quebec in 2001.

Ideally, an event such as the masters requires two years to prepare for, but he has bucked the theory and has performed well in the last two.

In the master class, he said, the competitors seem to train harder and take it more seriously than younger participants. The difference between younger and master competitors is that the preparation is gradual and consistent for the masters. Avoiding injuries is key.

Recommends starting slowly

For anyone interested in competing after a long layoff, Hawthorn recommends starting slowly and educating oneself on the technical side that includes waxing and equipment.

His start to competing was aided in large part by John Aalberg, who is the director at Whistler Olympic Park for the upcoming 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver.

Hawthorn hopes his own passion for the sport can motivate young people to get off the couch and take up a sport for life, instead of just during the younger years as in high school.

With less of an emphasis on competitive running, he has discovered a different side to the sport after integrating training runs with his 13-year-old daughter Natalia.

“When I see her do well in a race, the emotion is stronger watching her than what I do personally,” he said.

Hawthorn travelled to McCall Idaho to compete at the Masters World Cup, Feb. 28 to March 7.

Approximately 60 skiers represented Canada and Hawthorn said he was familiar with practically all of them.

Hawthorn added many friends he knew from his younger days were there, so it was nice to see them. But no matter how supportive they are of each other, each of them wanted to do well in his own right.

“You’re happy for your friends, but at the same time no one wants to get beaten,” he said.

His future goals are to continue competing against the best the world has to offer in such events as the World Masters hosted by Sweden next year and the World Loppet series that includes races that have fields numbering in the thousands. The experience of that kind of competition on that scale is exciting. To break into the top 10 is something he also wants to achieve.

“I’d love to break that barrier, but some of those guys are in another category,” he said.

“Each year you just try to do your best.”