Author: craigf

Bruce Arthur did the double in M21A on the Victorian Championships weekend, winning the Middle Distance Championships at Deadman’s Flat on Saturday and then backing up with another win in the Long Distance Championships on Sunday. The Long Distance title, the first he has won in his adopted home state, was particularly impressive, as he had to deal with the worst of the conditions on a 34-degree day (one of the hottest October days on record in Castlemaine) and won pulling away. Blair Trewin, who picked a good day to have an organiser’s early start, was second on both days, 1.30 down on Saturday and three minutes behind on Sunday.

Kathryn Ewels also took out her first senior long distance title, opening up a narrow lead in the technical first part of the course and holding it to the end, just over two minutes in front of Natasha Key. This was the reverse of the Saturday result, in which Key, who has impressed on the comeback trail in recent weeks, scored by just 12 seconds. Jasmine Neve was third on both days.

Middle distance results, splits and RouteGadget.

Long distance results, splits, and RouteGadget.

The Tasmanian sprint distance championships were held on a new Mike Morffew map in the Meehan Range recreation area, east of Hobart. At first glance, the area looks too steep for enjoyable orienteering, but a disused quarry proved ideal for the sprint format, with plenty of detail in the valley floor providing challenging courses with relatively little climb.

Ryan Smyth was a clear winner in M21, almost 4 minutes ahead of Jon McComb, with Nick Andrewartha third, just in front of Paul Pacque. In a close W21 race, Christine Marshall was a close winner from Christine Brown and Sue Hancock.

At the relay championships at Five Mile Beach the following day, course setter Lee Andrewartha made excellent use of a small area with a combination of standard relay course-forking and butterfly loops. At the race briefing, controller Wendy Andrewartha pointed this out to competitors, but at least half of those on the open course ignored the words of wisdom, and all teams were disqualified. Among those who should have known better were Mike Dowling and Paul Pacque (mis-punch), and Jon McComb (completely missed one of the loops on his course).

Australopers was the dominant club on the day, winning all the remaining courses.

Hanny Allston won the Melbourne Marathon yesterday in a fantastic time of 2hrs40mins34secs. In only her second marathon attempt, Hanny has quickly established credibility as an elite runner on the Australian athletics scene. Hanny competed in her first marathon in her hometown of Hobart in January, finishing first woman, and placing an impressive 6th overall.

With 664 females registered in the 42km race, the field was anticipated to be highly competitive and did not disappoint. Australians took out the trifecta with Hanny Allston (TAS) first in a personal best time of 02:40:34, Helen Stanton (QLD) second in 02:41:51 and Billinda Schipp (NSW) third in 02:42:22.

Hanny was with a pack of about 4 girls until 20km, but by half way they fell away quickly and soon Hanny had a 100m gap. From then on Hanny remained strong at about 3:45 pace and no other girls could match her.

The full results can be found at http://www.melbournemarathon.com.au/

Australia wrapped up the Oceania Championships week with a strong win in the Australia-New Zealand Challenge Relays claiming 20 victories to New Zealand’s four to win the Alan Brown Memorial Trophy.  Despite the loss of Greta Knarston to injury, New Zealand maintained its dominance of the junior elite classes winning both M & W20E. It also won M60A and W65A classes.

Three non-Challenge Australian teams caused upsets by winning their classes, in W16A, W21E and M21E. The M21E class was the most competitive Championship class with only 74 seconds separating the victorious Canberra Cockatoos team of Andy, Hogg, Murray Scown and David Shepherd and the NSW Stingers team of Eric Morris, Glenn Meyer and Julian Dent who was the only man to break 40 minutes on the course. It also had the biggest field of 10 teams.

The closest finish across all classes was in W45B, with only 11 seconds separating the first two teams.

Julian Dent made it a clean sweep of victories in Oceania Championship week by winning the Long Distance event at Boboyan Divide on Saturday. It was not his most convincing effort, but with his most likely challengers, Dave Shepherd and Simon Uppill, also having poor runs, it was good enough to win by a minute. Kerrin Rattray was second in the best elite result of his career so far, with Uppill in third place.

As they had done in the ACT Long Championships the previous weekend, less than a minute separated Grace Elson and Jo Allison, and once again Elson emerged victorious. They were comfortably clear of the rest of the field, with Tracy Bluett making up the placings five minutes back.

Lizzie Ingham continued the New Zealand domination of W20, but an excellent run by Morten Neve gave the locals joy in M20 for the first time this week.

Australia took out the Individual Challenge over New Zealand by 20 classes to 4. New Zealand took out M20, W20, M60 and W60 but Australia were victorious in all other classes.

The competition week finishes tomorrow with the Oceania Relays, which will also be the Australia-NZ Relay Challenge.

Julian Dent and Natasha Key took out the senior titles at the Oceania (and Australian) Sprint Championships in Canberra today, held on the complex Radford College map.

Both came from behind in close contests. The men’s race always looked like it would be a three-way battle, with Dent, Dave Shepherd and Simon Uppill likely to fight out the top places, once Ross Morrison had posted the fastest time of the earlier starters. All three were within a few seconds of each other at the spectator control. Uppill held a narrow lead there, with Dent five seconds in arrears, but he was able to turn that around over the last part of the course, winning by two seconds over Shepherd, with Uppill in third.

Seven seconds also covered the top three in W21E, but the rest of the field was within closer range too. The pace early in the course was set by the Victorian pair of Jasmine Neve and Kathryn Ewels, who swapped the lead for the first two-thirds of the course. Natasha Key was in third for much of the way, but was close enough to be able to take advantage when both Neve and Ewels lost small amounts of time at the third-last control. Grace Elson was level at the second-last but not quite fast enough in the finish, giving Key her biggest result of the last two years. Neve was third and Ewels fourth.

New Zealanders took out both junior titles. Greta Knarston was particularly impressive in W20E, winning in a time which would have placed her second in the open race, and Rachel Effeney was also competitive. Scott McDonald finished ahead of Jack Vincent in an M20E race in which only Rob Fell, in third, broke up an all-NZ top six.

The Australian Bushrangers had the better of the NZ Pinestars in the elite Test Match, taking the points 45 to 21.

The Championships continue with the Long Distance event tomorrow.

Today’s relay event held on Murryong East, an extension of the old Felled Timbers map, saw the final four races between New Zealand and Australian Schools Team.

Australia took an opening lead in the Junior Boys and Girls relay teams with New Zealand setting the pace in the senior categories. The Australian Junior Boys established a 4 minute lead after two legs whilst the Aussie junior girls established 7minutes after two legs.

The lead was narrowed by the third map change with the final junior runners for both countries hitting the course at roughly the same time.   In the senior races the New Zealanders established an early lead in both the senior categories and held that lead throughout the race.

Lachlan Dow, who set the fastest leg on the Senior Boys’ course, said that there was low visibility in the pine forest and the abundance of tracks made navigating difficult.  His time enabled Simon Mee (4^th leg AUS runner) to set up a possible win by the Australians. Unfortunately a 30 second error before the spectator control enabled New Zealand to hold onto a win not only in the senior boys but also in every other category.

In the end New Zealand had a clean sweep in the relays event taking a 6 – 2 win over Australia

A Total Fire Ban has been called from midnight Tuesday 2 October through to midnight Wednesday 3 October.  In normal circumstances this would mean that the events scheduled for Wednesday, ie Schools Relays & Public Teams race would be cancelled. However, ACT Forests has graciously agreed for the events to proceed on the basis that all Total Fire Ban conditions are met: in particular no fires, no barbecues, that an evacuation plan is in place and that competitors are briefed on safety measures including the importance of carrying a whistle and responding to whistle alerts.  All competitors are required to observe and respond to all safety directions given by event officials.

Bob Mouatt.
Carnival Director.

Today’s Oceania Middle Distance Championships, run on an extension of the Honeysuckle Creek map in Namadgi National Park near Canberra, included the Aus-NZ Schools Test Match, as well as an Elite Test Match.

In the Schools Test Match scores are level on 2 points apiece. NZ won both girls races through Jaime Goodwin (1st), Erin Paterson (3rd) and Laura Robertson (6th) in the Junior Girls, with Greta Knarston and Nicola Peat taking the top two places in Senior Girls and Rachel Goodwin 5th. The Junior Boys race was a tight affair, but the Australians (Kurt Neumann 1st, Dave Mallen 4th and Thomas Carter 6th) came through. In the senior boys Jack Vincent’s victory wasn’t enough to beat the Australians Lachlan Dow (2nd), Joshua Blatchford (3rd) and Simon Mee (4th). The Test Match concludes on Wednesday’s Relay race.

In the Elite Test Match the score finished Aus Bushrangers 49 to NZ Pinestars 17, thanks to strong performances to the likes of Julian Dent and Tracy Bluett. Dent once again dominated the race, winning by over two minutes from David Shepherd, with another 3 mintes to NZ Pinestar Ross Morrison. The W21E race was won by Grace Elson form Jo Allison (neither of whom are eligible
for Bushrangers selection) while Tracy Bluett ran strongly to finish 3rd. The Elite Test Matches will continue through the week.

The Oceania Championships Carnival kicked off today with the ACT Long Distance Championships. The venue was Foxlow Flats, classic Canberra spur-gully formerly known as Antill’s Creek, but unused for so long that the only version of the map is at 1:20,000!

The women’s elite race showed the strength and depth of Australian elite orienteering, with Grace Elson, Vanessa Round and Jo Allison all sharing the lead during the day, and finishing within a minute of each in that order. The New Zealanders seemed to be saving themselves for later in the week — Penny Kane was their quickest in 6th place.

The men’s elite race suffered from programming schedule; over half the field DNFed with most saving themselves for tomorrow’s Oceania Middle Distance Champs at Honeysuckle Creek. Julian Dent blew the field away, winning 20 of the 30 legs and finishing 5 minutes ahead of David Shepherd. Kerrin Rattray was 3rd, another 5 minutes back. The fastest Kiwi was James Bradshaw in 9th.