Victorian 5000m Championships

Melbourne University’s Sophie Barker and Box Hill’s Stephen Kelly took the Victorian men’s and women’s 5000 metres titles at Lakeside Stadium, Albert Park tonight (THURSDAY).
Neither looked the winner until late in the race. Barker trailed Sinead Diver for almost 4800 metres of the women’s race. Kelly appeared to be dropped by Liam Adams when the Athletics Essendon runner injected a 64-second lap with four laps to run.
Diver led Barker for almost the entire race with never much more than a stride separating the pair. l Barker made her move with just over 200 metres to run and raced home to win by 20 metres in 16:20.42.
Diver was second in 16:24.46 with Melbourne University’s Sarah McSweeney taking the bronze medal in 16:55.25.
Adams still led by five metres at the top of the final straight, but Kelly’s momentum was unstoppable by that stage. He raced home to win by over 10 metres in a personal best 13 minutes 53.27 seconds.
Adams took second in 13:55.51 with Duer Yoa of Ballarat’s Eureka club third in 14:11.85.

The race was broadcast by athsvicTV as a warmup for the ZATOPEK:10 on Saturday, December 8.

In other Melbourne University results, David Paroissien shaved more than ten seconds off his personal best to run 15:10.7 and take 6th in the B race.  Grant Morgan, animator of the race in the early stages came in 3 places later in 15:31.4.  Charlie Sheldon, Melbourne University’s number 1 wearer of visors, ran a very impressive 16:03 for 12th place in the C race.