Gonzaga distance runner James Mwaura ready to test himself against elite field at Lilac Grand Prix

In his still somewhat abbreviated collegiate experience, Gonzaga distance runner James Mwaura has chased elite competition and the clock to tracks all over the West – Eugene, Seattle, Palo Alto, Sacramento, College Station, Riverside.

Now opportunity is coming to him.

Mwaura has a spot alongside Olympic medalists, world record holders and national champions in the field for Friday night’s Lilac Grand Prix at the Podium, Spokane’s new multisport facility north of Riverfront Park.

The 13-event program – all track races between 600 and 5,000 meters, including two relays – begins at 5:50, with a two-hour running time.

There is also pay-per-view online streaming available through the meet producer, Tracklandia, with athletes sharing in that revenue through prize purses.

Nike’s Union Athletic Club out of Portland, under former Washington State cross country coach Pete Julian, is serving as the host team – and injecting some drama into the event with a pair of indoor world record attempts.

The first will come in the men’s 600 meters, with 2019 world 800 champion Donavan Brazier trying to lower his three-lap record of 1 minutes, 13.77 seconds – even though he “didn’t know we were competing to break a record until I saw Pete come out in an article saying that’s what our goal was,” he said.

“But we’re trying to run fast, for sure.”

The meet will conclude with the Union quartet of Ella Donaghu, Olympic bronze medalist Raevyn Rogers, Sinclaire Johnson and Shannon Osika taking aim at the world indoor standard of 10:40.31 in the women’s distance medley relay set five years ago by a United States team that included 2021 Olympic sensation Sydney McLaughlin and three-time Olympian Jenny Simpson.

The Portland team will likely be running strictly against the clock “and it’s going to take a little more grit and focus to keep the momentum going,” Osika acknowledged. “But regardless, I think we can get it done.”

But there should be no shortage of head-to-head competition before that.

That’s the lure for Mwaura, the Gonzaga junior who last spring became the first Bulldog to qualify for the U.S. Olympic Trials. He’ll line up in the men’s 3,000 against the likes of 2016 U.S. Olympian Ben Blankenship and Jake Heyward, who made Great Britain’s 2021 team.

“When you’re going against those top guys, you think about how experienced they are – you’re kind of seeing just how long you can hang on with them rather than running for a time,” Mwaura said. “But it’s a confidence booster to be able to race them and trying to compete at a higher level.”

Among the other notable entrants are Jessica Hull, a four-time NCAA champion at Oregon and holder of five Australian records, German world championship bronze medalist Konstanze Klosterhalfen and Craig Engels, the 2019 American 1,500 champion.

Nine sub-4-minute milers have entered the men’s 1,500, among them Australian Olympian and 2021 NCAA indoor winner Charlie Hunter, 3:51 miler Henry Wynne of the Brooks Beasts and former Washington State standout Paul Ryan.

Julian is hopeful public response can help turn this into something more than a one-off event.

“This is a city that’s ready and that’s been putting on high-level sports events in basketball and other things for a long time,” he said. “Why can’t it be a great destination for track, too?”

“When a community invests in the sport like Spokane has to build the Podium, we have to come and make things happen,” Tracklandia founder Jeff Merrill said.