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My six year old niece spent the afternoon yesterday at her school athletics carnival. She’s tall and a bit gangly, (hell, she’s a Hanrahan) Unlike most of the Bayside crew, she isn’t much of a runner. She came last this very day a year ago and got teased a little in the process, which automatically means that she hates running now. She sometimes drops the ball, sometimes misses the goal and generally doesn’t achieve a whole lot on the sporting arena. (She’s a hell of a reader, though.) Scared of failure, she’s spent the last week working out ways to avoid having to compete at the sports day. So far we’ve heard of her tummy problems, her headaches and my personal favourite, her desire to get lice. All this simply to get out of having to compete in athletics. She’s cried a fair bit about it all in the lead up.
It does beg the question what are we if we’re not winners? With finals starting next Tuesday, there’s a whole lot of folk gearing themselves up to try and beat the other competitors. As a team, we’re doing our best to try and take our fourth and fifth titles in four years. No doubt Tim, myself and the rest of the Bayside family will be shouting ourselves hoarse in order to get the athletes across the line. We want to win, but if we don’t?
In my Michael Keaton type of reminiscence, it reminds me of the story from the 1988 Olympics where the 400 metre runner from Oman, Al Somaly, I think, had his final shown live on the Oman television network back home. He came of out of the blocks slowly, fell to the back of the field and finished last in the final, leaving everyone else to surmise that this was all that he did at the Olympics. They didn’t get the chance to see the previous three rounds against the world’s best.
So if we don’t win, if nothing else we’ve got the ability to console ourselves with the fact that it weren’t for lack of trying. Ask your coach next time you see them at training whether they’re holding some of their knowledge back, simply for the sake of having something over you. Ask yourself next time you peel yourself off the floor in the gym or the training track whether you gave it your all. Or try and work out whether the fact that you see more of your coach and your training squad than your friends and family holds any significance.
The last thing athletics needs right now is more opportunities to send someone home saying that they’re not good enough. Therefore, on behalf of Tim and myself, I’d like to say now that we’re both very thankful for your efforts over the season. There have been enough cold nights for us to wonder whether it is all worth it. These, along with the unanswered phonecalls and the unreturned e-mails, sometimes leave us pulling our hair out. Yet something has kept bringing us back each week. Some days I’d say it’s the people, some days the performances, other days neither. But every day, it’s the effort.
So as with all the other reports, I thought it’d be nice to recognise those who got the most out of themselves yesterday. There were some great highlights on a cold autumn night.
Sometimes it’s easy to pick those who did themselves proud you can tell by the result. Clint running 3:48.2 in the 1500 and nearly picking off Kris McCarthy in the last 15 metres, Carl Moorhouse in the 100, running nearly the fastest time of the night from Heat two, Tamsyn running 52.85 in the 400 against a field that included Dressler, Hewitt and Porter. Or else Bec Neilsen throwing a pb in the shot, as did her invitation throwing partner, Tessa Densley, who cracked 12 metres for the first time.
Sometimes it harder to tell, as the results don’t necessarily reflect what’s been left on the track, or the field. They’re the same type of people who fight tooth and nail to finish a race seventh rather than eight. The irony is that if either of our teams have any chance of winning over the next two weeks, it’ll be because of these folk equally as much as the winners. Evan Rees picking up the job of third runner in the 4*100 when nobody else was around, Nfa running the high hurdles with a cast on his arm or Dane Frey pushing out one more 1500 at the end of an eight month season. For the girls, it was Tara Gleeson pushing herself like she always does in the 400, Jeanette filling in at late notice for the relay, Celia Brown jumping up to the 1500 as a 400 hurdles specialist, or maybe Claire Robinson in the 400 on a cold and blustery night. A special big thanks to the three Brits who return to there homeland soon, one comp shy of finals eligibility, but great to have them all the same. Hopefully they’ll be back on our shores in the Bayside colours at a future time.
Next weeks report will no doubt be back to information, salutations
and congratulations. But first, please remember the golden rules for
finals.
1.) Two numbers front and back
2.) Correct uniform
3.) Let someone (Tim or myself) know when you’ve arrived
4.) Let someone know if you’re unable to compete
5.) Come and let us know afterwards how you went
For those non-athletically gifted ones out there, please come along and cheer us on next Tuesday as we hit Round One of the finals. There’s nothing like the feeling that people are on your side. It all kicks off at 6:45 and should be finished by 9:30.
My niece told us the other day that she wants to run better. She’s six and has decided that she needs training in order to improve as a runner. Six year olds sometimes think too much like an adult. She went out onto the track more nervous than an Olympic finalist, eyeing up her opposition across the track. Under instructions from her mother, she took a deep breath just before the start of the race. She held it in tight and when the gun went, she went out and did her best. I won’t tell you where she finished. Sometimes it just doesn’t matter.
Wishing you all a lice free weekend.
Results are here.
The last Report was Round 11.