We ended up with quite a hot day at the iconic Hillwood course today, maybe it was too hot for some as there were a few late withdrawals. There was the usual banter in the air with everyone comparing injuries, suggesting they had no chance and admiring Zeggy running his 15k warm up around the oval. When it was all said and done Mark Cullen made Hillwood look easy today, taking out the race and seemingly checking his email as he crossed through the finish line (or he was stopping his timer most likely). This was Mark’s first win in division one. He has been improving every single week and it was a well deserved win for Mark.
In second place was Leigh Jessup who must have dropped a slab off at the handicappers house during the week, as he certainly had the strut of a man destined for the podium pre race. Leigh was close to his outstanding best storming into second. In third place was long time lovable club member Ricky Markham, the man who always finds a bit of a sprint if you try to pass him was able to storm (I think i used the word storm already where is that thesaurus ) home to complete the podium.
Our fastest male was Matthew Zegveld who warmed up and cooled down longer than the main race and our fastest female was the ever young Deborah Pauna who always makes the hills look so easy, well done to you both.
The Division 2 race was 5 laps and was a hotly contested affair taken out by local cricket star Tim Reese (check out youtube for catch of the year) he held off a fast finishing Lucy Jackson and not far behind was Jack Barnard, only 40 seconds separated the three of these outstanding runners. Our fastest under 18 female was Jada Rowlings, she is improving her speed every week in the division two and our fastest under 18 male was Harry Jackson, another who makes running look effortless at time, congratulations to you both.
Our juniors got the cooler conditions first up and the top 8 finished within 30 seconds of each other, a race photographers nightmare. Fortunately the photographers skill matches his good looks and he got everyone in. Anyway the race was won by Mia Eastley , showing outstanding determination to pip Jake Walker by 3 seconds, a great race between them, a few seconds behind was the speedy Flynn Murray, who finished fast and almost pinched it. Our fastest male in this race was Flynn and the fastest female was Jacinta Rowlings. The spirit and enthusiasm from our juniors in 2022 is outstanding, well done to all the kids.
Results for today’s race are here.
A big thank you to all our volunteers and it was marvelous to have club secretary Rod Howell back as race director today, his soothing 50s radio voice is always welcome at the club and the event went off without a hitch thanks to his organisation. I want to make special mention to a few people, Peter Lee-Archer who turns up every week to start the main race, I think he enjoys the opportunity to be in charge for a change, Ricky Barnwall who stepped up and towed the caravan every week so far this season, Jo Cowie who has volunteered every week to go stand out in the far reaches for the short course races and of course Tim Reese who has taken over the timing this year so the races can go ahead. Many others help make things happen as well of course.
Next week we are off to Low Head you can enter that race here by clicking here. This race has a new sponsor who has stepped up this week, long time club member Scott Greaves has been generous enough to sponsor the race and we welcome aboard Greaves Engineering and Design. We look forward to seeing you there.
In other news our half marathon will be held at Heritage Forest and will be Johnno’s old Launceston Marathon course (well the half course), maps and further details to come. We also have race counts that we will publish to the website soon with some updates on milestones and prizes, so stay tuned.
