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This was the report for week 3 at Geelong. It was released prior to the official results, hence some of the vagueness (I only said some of it)
THE MEN
Team Manager Tim (TMT) was on the shoe phone pretty much all week to try and scrape together a team for what is the toughest round in the book. Geelong is precariously positioned only 6782 witches hats away from Melbourne, making management a less than easy task. With Bracksie about to sweep the pools, all of the orange implements were positioned off to the side of the road, which enabled me to get in an early bucket of chips prior to the commencement of competition – but more on them later.
It must be said that we had some classy athletes down at Geelong in the Bayside colour, however there were not nearly enough positions filled for us to be competitive. Justin Lewis stepped out in the 200 with an official wind reading of about 1.6, but an unofficial tail wind along the top bend in the William Snoddy territory (look him up!). Justin ran a strong bend but was passed by Marty Duke in the run home. No Arnold and a missing Paul Burnett meant that Signor Groves stepped into the blocks as the No. 2 runner. Sore hammies aside, Grovesy did a fine job of running for 165 metres before stopping to do a quick tap dance near the line. Finish time of 23.7ish was enough to get us some good points.
There was only one runner for us in the 800, but it was Brenno and he ran like three men, going through the bell in 55 and fifteen metres clear of his opposition. He continued down the widest back straight in history, electing not to push to hard as he heard nothing but groans of anguish from people watching the Long Jump competition, but more on that later. The man in blue didn’t finish in 1.52 as a poet would expect, but did come home a couple of seconds later, overall a little disappointed that he wasn’t in the faster races.
In the high hurdles it was a return to days of old, with two fine young men doing their thing. Tim Ewen blitzed the field as one would expect, finishing in 14.25ish and was generally happy with his first hitout, as was Paul Harlond, who ducked under 16 seconds after recovering from Glandular Fever. Bayside Central is expecting big things from both these men and the award winning Nfa as the season progresses.
Keeping with the track events, as that was all that was worthwhile, TMT and Dean Lane both stepped out in what would have been a highly anticipated race had the weather been calm. As it was Messrs Troop and Forrest put on a fine display of three k running, stringing out the field from very early on. But Tim and Dean didn’t fuss, knowing their own pacing regime as they pass through the 2k mark right on the 6 minute mark. Dean then found something special from there on, as did Tim, whilst they pitted themselves against the clock. Now I could be wrong here, but Lee Troop continued on his way after Shawn Forrest stopped and proceeded to run a 5k in 13.37ish in extreme conditions. Definitely the highlight of my day, except for finding out that the Long Jump pit had a three metre board, but more on that later.
Other than that, we had nothing, except for a fuzzy wuzzy guy out in the infield, who I can only assume was hired by the Geelong Venue as a crowd warm up dude. Very disappointing really. Like all good clowns his clothes didn’t quite fit, he did some things that looked extreme but the reality is that he just wasn’t funny. Surely John Burgess should get the gig next time.
So it came to the relay. After believing that Justin Lewis had gone home, as he rightfully should have, I decided to eat 50 cents of strawberries and creams and 50 cents of chocolate buds only to find that TMT had found a fourth runner for the relay. A big hooray to David Stones for filling in the gaps and yet a big boo to him too as it meant I ran 400 more metres than was necessary. Justin and Brenno were good enough to do the hard yards after David’s first leg and managed to get me into a losing position. Like all good jockeys, I took it, and never really looked back.
My apologies to Brenno for not really saying goodbye afterwards, but he got the general message as I continued to look for my keys for the next ten minutes.
To the WOMEN
After similar amounts of phonecalls and communication breakdowns, we actually managed to fill a fair proportion of the team. Best news of all was that a lot of them performed remarkable feats of distinction.
Kate Smyth led by example, turning up unannounced and showing the judges on the start line just what colour her shorts were in order to prove that she was eligible to run. Kate ran a solid three k, finishing about fifth behind Serena Gibbs and then proceeding to do five victory laps in an effort to attract the interest of the crowd and dodge hurdles at the same time before finishing to get her 5k time. As always, this is going beyond the call of duty and Kate should be congratulated.
In a not dissimilar position, Bronwyn Liozou, put her hand up as our only 800 runner. Blustery conditions, shocking day, pb! It’s as simple as that, with Bronwyn crossing the line as the electronic clock ticked over to 2min 15. No doubt there is more to come.
Highlight for the day from a historical perspective has to be our first ever mother/daughter combination in the Bayside colours. As far as we know this has to be a first (Young Finn Hanrahan hasn’t quite walked as yet), with daughter Gabi, no slouch over the 200, pulling on the top to run a 4*400 leg in an all Frankston team. Huge thanks to Tara Gleeson who came down and ran a 26.5 second 200 and then backed up for the relay.
Doing the same was Katrina Steward, who drew Sandra Porter in the first heat of the 200m and whilst a little down in the first 100, reeled her in and drew away by almost a metre in a new pb of 24.2sec. Check the AV results for the electronic version, probably still 24.50 or so. This, as you well know, is super duper really fast running what was that type running and will hopefully give Katrina the confidence to continue to excel at the highest level.
Another pb in the 200 to Jeanette, our specialist sprinter for the day, and why not, with a half second pb and a legal wind, it all makes good sense. For all those wishing to excel, Jeanette used the ‘Let’s stay overnight at Deer Park’ principle and obviously had the psychological edge – everyone runs fast out at Deer Park.
Megan Peters came along, puppiless, I believe this time to beat half the men home in the walk as she usually does whilst the other Megan, Miss Boysey Idaho, was smiling all the way to Little River as she threw a pb in the Discus with those crazy Geelong winds that the throwers love so much. Not really sure that they help Bec in the shot put, but you never know. In the Long Jump, Kylie Reed did what her male counterpart should have done and pulled out with a sore heel after one jump, whilst Gab Neighbour and Viv scored points, but probably not enough, to get us over the line against Melbourne Uni. Our first loss for the year, but not one to be too disheartened about.
And so we say goodbye to the good folk at Geelong for another year, hoping that next time around, the freeway will be 4 lanes wide and that the whole teleportation thing will have kicked in.
Results are here.