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Saturday, 27 April 2013

2013 Shaw Baton Relays Battle Hill Pauatahanui Sat 27 Apr

The Shaw Baton relay race is the first inter-club event of the winter season centre and generally well supported. As cross country races go it has everything, flat bits, boggy bits, grass, gravel, wooden jumps, a water obstacle, uphill, downhill and great scenery. The place to be is the water jump because this is where the minor mishaps are likely to occur and in front of the enthusiastic gallery ready to applaud those water crossings perfectly executed. Not all made it with dignity, but because the clock is ticking there is no time for team runners to reflect on what went wrong. As usual the Olympic Club were efficient with their organisation and with the speedy production of preliminary team results.
Photos

Rowan Hooper leading the way in the 6 Lap race

Some minor mishaps in no particular order

Sunday, 31 March 2013

2013 Wellington Track & Field 10,000m Champs Newtown Park Sat 30 Mar

There were 18 pre-entries for the 10k champs but in the end only about half of those turned up. The winner of the men's race was Mark Searle running in Upper Hutt Athletic colours. The unofficial time for the 25 laps was around 35 minutes. Hinano Sefsi from Scottish ran a steady race to win the women's title. Well done to both. Official results..

Also in the 10k field was the remarkable 83 year old Michael Browne a former junior Vosseler shield race winner. A true inspiration.

There were also a couple of other track and field events on the programme notably an 800m and 1500m designed to allow athletes to meet qualifying times for various future events. In the 800m Alex Jordan took the role of as pacemaker in a race that was eventually won by a fast-finishing

Hamish Carson the current national 1500m champion. As usual Julie, Hamish's mum and biggest supporter was on hand to support and cheer him on.

Probably the most interesting race of the day was the B 800m which was only decided on the finish line. On lap 1 Julian Baker (WHAC) cleared out with what appeared to be an unassailable lead. In his wake Chris McIlroy and Luke O'Donnell (both Scottish) battled it out for 2nd and 3rd. On the last lap though McIlroy and O'Donnel closed the gap quickly and by the top of the finish straight were close enough to catch up to Baker and grasp 1st and 2nd. This was a great race to watch and proves that it ain't all over till the fat lady sings. A terrific effort from all three.

Newtown Park regular Saravee Sos having it all his own way in the sprints. This guy gives nothing less than 100%

The last race on the programme was a 1500m designed to allow some our elite middle distance runners post qualifying times. I switched camera bodies from a Mark II to a Mark IV for the shots because of the low light. Needless to say the results were disappointing and the decent images that are worth posting are below and include race winner Calum Moodyfrom the New Brighton Olympic club.

Monday, 18 February 2013

2013 AMI Round the Bays Half Marathon (incl ANZ Half Marathon Champs)

In the half-marathon it was wall to wall people going both ways at the Massey road drinks stations. For about 20 minutes at the height of the flow of competitors crammed the road with little room to move. The leader of the cadet squad that manned 3 of the drink stations estimated they went through about 5000 drink cups during the morning. The team at Massey did a good job too, as there was only a small time gap before the runners heading back from the turnaround were looking for liquid refreshment again. Luckily it wasn’t a windy day otherwise the harbour would have been full of polystyrene cups.

The winning time for the men’s half-marathon was 1.8.51 for Hamish Carson (Scottish) followed by Dougal Thorburn (Ariki) in 1.9.17 and Stephen Lett (Takapuna) in 1.10.11. For the women Alexandra Williams (Canterbury University) crossed the line in 1.18.15 in front of Gabriel O’Rourke (Wellington) in 1.19.43 and Annika Rihma in 1.21.34. Interestingly the organisers estimated that with an 8.00am start, the first runners in the half-marathon would be finishing at 9.00am. Someone is either incredibly optimistic or has made a typo. This is either Across town in the 7k Run for Fun, the fastest times for the women were Tina Harris (24.15), Sarah Christie (24.45), Genna Cartright (24.55) and for the men Martin van Barneveld (20.05), Tim Hodge (20.06), Ben Barry (20.09). It should be no surprise that the fastest 5 men at the finish are members of Scottish Athletics although for the run, they were all members of the Sharp Corporation team.

The Monday 18 Feb edition of the Dominion Post has pages and pages of alphabetised results, which would make great reading provided you have a magnifying glass. Better to check out the online results for both the 7km and half-marathon and the Athletics New Zealand results for the half-marathon championship.