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State League returned to its native habitat (i.e. Olympic Park) last night. We got to get back in the announcers’ box away from the rabble and the Bayside team kept on their winning way. Of course, I speak of the all-powerful women’s team. The men may or may not have won – AV aint telling us nothing.
So to the Match Reports…
The man of the neverending spoken sentence, the voice of State League Athletics, Justin Hanrahan had this to say about the performance on the Men’s team:
What started out a blustery old night for the sprinters turned into a pretty damn fine night for 400m running. As for one of the commentary team, well let’s just say that calling races is easy, it’s the talking in between that makes you sound like a total fool...
The sprints saw a new, revamped Bayside team with Paul Burnett, Arnold Pamphlis and youngster Chris Costanzo showing us their form. Paul is an old hand at sprinting at State League (and in the pro ranks) but it was his Bayside debut and he was involved in possibly the closest race since the semi-final of the 60m at the 1999 World Indoors in Budapest. Pipped by less than a metre, Paul looked in good shape and will obviously improve. Arnold flew out of the blocks only to feel his hamstring twinge in his heat, still he managed to run a controlled race and come second. Chris used this as his warm up for the all schools next week and looked very sharp coming second in his SL debut.
At 400 we had an entirely different line up to the three heat winners from a fortnight ago. In what was the best SL 400m field in years, Brendan Cole ran a HUGE PB, taking half a second of his previous best and running 47.79s. Just a stride down on Olympian Michaal Hazel is pretty good form. Another youngster ran the second heat for us. Stefan Garruba ran a very strong 50.11 to come second following his excellent relay leg. The youngest "old man of athletics" going around, Stuart Laidlaw, ran a great last 100m and came second in his heat after a lenghty break with a few injury problems. Won't be long before Stu is back to his best.
Zac Ashkanasay made his first appearance in Victorian SL after moving down from QLD in the off-season. 2nd at the nationals over 1500m last season, Zac's 3.52 last night augers well for this long season and he will complete a great trio of 1500m runners for Bayside later in the season. Tim Crosbie has indeed found that fountain of youth and keeps on improving. A 4.01+ is getting down there and more time will come off it. Dean Lane needed some speed in his legs before the Zatopek next week and he got it. Good luck next week, Dean.
The relay looked slick (as it always does)...A victory in 42.54 no less.
No walkers, no vaulter, only one point scoring hurdler, but, wait for it. Bayside men scored points in the steeple!!!! Not since Tony Wilson trundled around two seasons ago have we registered a point in this event - some great efforts, but no points - and then along comes a man called FUZZ! Corey Lawson may have looked exhausted at the end of his run, but you can be sure that he felt pretty bloody good about running a 20-odd second PB and cruising home in 9.56. Super effort Fuzz, now put yourself in cotton wool until finals time (if we make it...)
Matt Cooter warmed up for the all-schools by being his usual consistent self in the triple jump. If you don't know Matt yet, keep an eye out for the coolest customer on the run-up. He is just too reliable and talented...
How young is our team???
Paul Peulich doubled this week in the hammer and shot and the yr 11 student went sooo close to cracking the 16m mark in the shot. It will come and then so will 16.25, 16.50, 16.75 etc etc. (Authors note: I am struggling to crack 16m in the discus at the moment - that is how good Paul is/how bad I am.)
Matt Brown - what the hell is the story with the royal blue t-shirt and emerald green tights? Just as well you made my night by giving me part of your chicken...oh, and by the way, Matt was second in the discus. Goes to show you don't need fashion sense to perform well.
Joel Graham looks like he has the high jump spot for a while. After a few weeks without anyone competing for us, Joel has stepped up and is doing very well. 1.85 looked easy last night and look out for a lot of improvement later in the season. Joel, like most of our team, is also younger than some of my injuries.
Tommy Farr held off the recently employed Dave McCaffrey in another grudge match in the Jav and continues to pick up plenty of points for the team - coming second last night, if my memory serves me.
That is about it from me, except to say good luck to all our athletes competing at the All-Schools, Zatopek and schoolies week.
I think we came second, but the scoring system is lagging a little this season - stay tuned.
Women’s report from Andre The elusive Matt Hanrahan was again off in a bunker somewhere last night. He managed the team by sending telepathic messages to me as I dashed around the venue looking busy. And what a fine job he did.
As veteran of the management game, Jussie, said as we dawdled out of the empty arena last night, “Resist the temptation Grasshopper to make mountains of the gaps on your team sheet. Appreciate the names you have as they will score you mountains of points” (He then mumbled something about “blessed are discus throwers bearing chicken”).
So it was last night. Despite a couple of late scratchings that had me cursing, there were plenty of Baysiders going round, and performing like a team of finals contenders.
It wasn’t a great night for sprinting but Katie Chivers and Jeanette Bowles braved the headwinds and performed very strongly. We look forward to more runs from Katie after the All Schools.
Our 1500 running stocks improve every week. Katie Seibold made a last minute decision that she was available. A great decision it turned out to be as Katie wound in a couple of quality athletes at the 800 mark and ran away for a big PB, a Nationals qualifier and a maiden State League victory. Katie has improved steadily over the past three years and her victory was well deserved. Good luck in the Zatopek next week. Sue Gloster and Helena Montgomery were able back-ups.
In a big pointscoring coup we had two walkers on the track last night. Megan Peters made it two victories in a row while Shirley Hay wasn’t too far back.
Jeanette Bowles keeps getting talked up in these reports. But if she keeps jumping PBs like she did last night we’ll keep telling you how great she is. A legal 12.17 in triple last night brought a big smile. She followed that up with her 100m run and a very strong anchor leg in the relay. Two other relay members kept their spikes for the hurdles. Sarah Dosen kept her good form going with a win, while Karin is taking a more karate-style approach to hurdling.
Tessa Densley is Miss Consistent over at High Jump – another comp, another win, another leap of 1.70m. Sarah Wiltshire was back polevaulting and cleared a couple of heights that I saw.
Our throwers threw as well as ever. Bec Neilsen covered for Gab Neighbour who is off doing Schoolies stuff – and scored a win, and another in shot. Boyesey was swearing after a third in discus, while Siobhan was over 40m again in javelin.
Finally I’d like to welcome a newcomer to our family. Making the trek from down past the Giant Worm, Melissa Jones run a very nice 3k Steeple. We look forward to seeing more of them.
Likewise, we’d love to see a few 400m runners. The absence of Bayside colours in the last event of the programme could have hurt us last night. By my calculations we were too far in front for it to matter. We’ll wait and see what the scorers finally calculate.
Next week there is NO State League> State League returns December 13th.
Results are here.
Last week's Reports are here.