2017 Victorian Track Relay Championships

The championship season got off to a great start for MUAC with four medals won and our two 4x400m teams qualifying for the big dance at Zatopek in a few weeks time.  The MUAC Members Marquee on the Eastern Hill was buzzing all day with the good performances.  A great team effort helped us hit the first of our big club goals of the summer: getting our 4x400m teams to Zatopek and fielding teams in all open relays. Watch out for 2018’s MUAC Relays to be even bigger with more audacious goals.

The first medal of the day came in the 4x1500m for Open Men, with 2 MUAC teams in the race.  The A team of Frankie Conway, Jack Hughes, Jack Morrison and Jordan Mayston weren’t intimidated lining up against a St Kevin’s team with two 2016 Olympians and a current Australian record holder in the line up.  Our 17:34.09 performance was garnered the team a bronze medal, with the B team 3 places further back in 6th. MUAC’s Open Women, Stella Radford, Sarah McSweeney, Ciara Boyd-Squires Long and Anna Louey, matched their effort in the 4x1500m collecting a bronze in a race with some questionable lap counting. MUAC’s masters team of Tim Thomas, Tony Brain, Phil Van Dueren and Hamish Beaumont took 6th place in the 40+ 4x1500m in 20:59.4.

After several years of coming close to making the 4x400m finals at Zatopek, MUAC qualified both Open Women and Open Men to the event with strong runs.  Liz Ruach, Rosamond Gilden, Eleni Gilden and Catriona Bissett locked up their spot in the first heat, taking second spot and an automatic qualifier in 3:54.15. The Men, Harry Kimpton-Moss, Matt Scott, Jarrod Pageot and Tristan Freulon Hernandez were the fastest non automatic qualifiers and third fastest overall, running 3:17.30.

Both 4x100m teams ran very well finishing just outside the finals with the women (Jayne Iwunze, Liz Ruach, Rosamond Gilden and Eleni Gilden) 10th fastest in 50.01 and the men (Jarrod Pageot, Matt Scott, Tristan Freulon Hernandez and Hamed Aljuma) also 10th in 43.25.

The day was capped off with two more medals in the 4x800m races.  MUAC’s women lined up against a Box Hill team featuring two 2017 World Championship representatives and we held our own, leading the race until well after halfway.  The team of  Catriona Bissett, Katrina Anderson, Emily French and Pippa Trevella collected our third bronze of the day running 9:23.32.  MUAC’s men lined up against an equally formidable St Kevin’s team with multiple international athletes and again took it up to them with Matt Scott’s second leg putting the team in the lead.  Strong runs from Jack Hughes, Pete Gaukrodger and Michael Dardis garnered MUAC’s fourth medal to round out the day.

A big thanks to Phil Van Dueren for his photography and Tim Thomas for his logistical help.

MUAC will be back in action this weekend at Round 5 of AV Shield.

Results