XCR Round 4 - St Anne’s Winery Bendigo
Well done by 15 Waverley athletes plus Yvonne who made the trip out to Bendigo for Round 4 of the XCR24 season. It’s always good to combine an XCR event with a winery and the Waverley bus was in full swing again with the best bus driver in the land, James McEniry. The Waverley tent was squeezed into the back and after a pick up of the Malvern crew and Em, and the obligatory stop at the excellent Malmsbury Bakery, our bus rolled into the winery just after midday. As usual James managed to find the prime position for the Waverley bus and we found a good spot for our tent with Malvern right next door.
First away was the 4K event, with Matt Harvey and Simone taking on the hilly course. Matt continues to improve, impressively running over 6 minutes quicker than last year. Simone debuted for the season and finished within just 7 seconds of her estimated time.
Then it was the men’s turn to take on 2 laps – 8K. Davin thrived on the challenging terrain and finished 2nd in his age group. Ernie ran nearly 2 minutes quicker than last year. James McEniry was our 3rd runner in with his best run of the season, then Michael Jansen and Smurf and a quite unwell Michael Harvey battling through to the finish.
In the womens race, Sally and Niamh were very close together for most of the first lap before Sally pulled away and dominated the second lap. Sally finished nearly a minute ahead and 4th in her age group, with Niamh 6th in her age group. Both were in the top 80 overall.
It was also very close between Janice, Wendy and Em. Janice led them through most of the course, but Wendy found something special at the end and in the last sprint up the hill just pipped Janice across the line. Both collapsed spent at the end, but it was the best run of the season for both of them, and Em was just behind. Em impressively finished within 2 seconds of her estimated time to take out the closest to the pin. Well done Em. Linda is dong so well in her first season, and was our next in. Jackie’s legs were suffering after 7 parkruns in a day the previous Sunday and after a lap said they’d had enough and it was time for the winery.
So off to the winery we went and as usual Waverley was the biggest and loudest and happiest team and the last to leave. A tradition we’ve held proud for many years now. It was good to have a few of the Malvern team joining us this year and I think we might be bringing out the party side of Malvern as well.
Overall our mens team was quite depleted relative to other events, but we did manage 7th place in M50+. We’ll have to watch ourselves in Div 3 as we’re currently in the relegation zone (bottom 2). But hopefully we can lift in some of the longer events.
Our womens teams did quite well finishing 4th in Div 3, 3rd in Div 4 and 5th in W50+. So well done by our women, both running and partying so well.
Our next event is the Sandown relays on Saturday 29th June. Please rsvp in the Team App if you can make it so I can pull lots of good teams together. Hopefully we’ll get back to full strength again for this one.
Our times are below and full results are at:
https://athsvic.resultshub.com.au/#
Male 18
4km: Matt Harvey 18:21;
4km: Simone Albiston 33:53;
Male Open
8km: Davin Hopper 31:39; Ernest Lim 34:36; James McEniry 38:31; Michael Jansen 41:21; Ewen Vowels 41:50; Michael Harvey 47:35;
Female Open
8km: Sally Lim 36:37; Niamh O’Reilly 37:31; Wendy Masters 43:04; Janice Marston 43:06; Emily Stokes 44:01; Linda Sharp 48:18;
The open mens race was won by Ed Marks (Glenhuntly) in 23:55, just 3 seconds ahead of Andy Buchanan (Bendigo). Bendigo won Div 1 ahead of Glenhuntly.
The open womens race was won easily by Katherine Downey from Ballarat in 28:38. Sandringham won Div 1 with South Melbourne second.
In our Waverley Winter Trophy, Sally moves further ahead with her big run, with Niamh second and Davin 3rd.
