The Africans are expected to dominate. It's no surprise when a Kenyan you've never heard of comes out and runs low 13s, it's just another African doing what Africans do.
When a white Canadian kid does it of course your gonna take notice, especially with the added novelty of the crazy high mileage.
If it was a Norwegian/Irish/ guy then it would be the same thing. Same with Rupp in the Olympic 10k. It's not racist to want him to win. The anomaly of a competitive white guy in a distance race creates the illusion of an underdog and people have supported the underdog since forever.
The first white guy home at the weekend was Rooney, technically a foreigner. Yet there were many people singing his praises on here. Yeah it's about the colour of his skin, but not in a racist way. He gets some love from letsrun because of the oddity that is an Irishman mixing it with the Africans.
You can flip it completely look at sport dominated by white guys. If a black cyclist started competing for the Tour then everyone would jump on his bandwagon.
But of course there's always some full blown racists out there too.