A wonderful day was had by a record number of SKAAC athletes at the 2017 Victorian Relay Championships on 11 November at Lakeside Stadium. With the event bought forward two weeks due to the 2018 GoldM Coast Commonwealth Games, one would have thought numbers would be down, but for SKAAC it was records everywhere. Nearly 50 athletes took to the track to take on the best, with stellar performances everywhere. SKAAC won 5 medals and also qualified for the Open Mens 4×400. Arguably, the most famous performance was by the Women’s Open Medley Relay who teamed brilliantly to claim the Silver medal, SKAAC’s first ever female Women’s State Relays medal. With all the highlights, the best way to summarise the day is by numbers, see below:-
1… as in Silver Medals to our Open Women’s Medley Relay team (4:16.64) comprising of Amanda Pang, Ali Hynes, Sarah Minahan & Kayla DeBondt
1… as in spikes ripped by Steve Knuckey to shreds in pursuit of the ultimate success.
1… as in Bronze medals secured by the Open mens 4×100 team (41.95) consisting of Jackson Bennett, Michael Romanin, Phil Borg & Joel Bee.
2… as in tents required to cater for the huge SKAAC contingent that converged on Lakeside for the day
3… as in Gold Medals secured by SKAAC. The winning teams were the Mens 40+ 4×1500 (19:15.91) relay team consisting of Joe Lynch, Luke Goodman, Lincoln Mah & Aaron Little. Mens Open 4×1500 (15:31.51) consisting of Adam Pyke, Alex Rowe, Peter Bol & Luke Mathews. The Mens Open 4x800m (7:41.09) consisting of Steve Fabris, Brad Mathas, Joseph Deng & Peter Bol.
5… as in Women’s teams entered by SKAAC, clearly the most ever in our history.
7… as in the number of debutants that wore the famous colours for the first time. Welcome to Zoe Wong, Tess Graham, Sophie Dole, Sam Cantwell, Finn Davern, Lulu Goodman & Ali Hynes.
12…as in hours the day went for
16… as in the club records broken by our 5 female teams on the day.
17…as in total SKAAC teams entered on the day, surpassing our previous record of 11 set last year.
23… as in club records broken on the day…
Open Womens Medley, 4:16 64 (Amanda Pang, Ali Hynes, Sarah Minahan & Kayla de Bondt)
Open Womens 4×400, 4:18.22 (Amanda Pang, Sarah Minahan, Ali Hynes, Kayla de Bondt)
Under 14-20 Womens’s 4×100, 57.26 (Tess Graham, Zoe Wong, Lauren McGarry & Alessia Acquaro)
Under 14-20 Womens’s 4×400, 5:06.94 (Alessia Acquaro, Lulu Goodman, Sophie Dole & Lauren McGarry)
Open Mens 4×100, 41.95 (Joel Bee, Michael Romanin, Phil Borg & Jackson Bennett) and again in the final (Jackson Bennett, Michael Romanin, Phil Borg & Joel Bee)
Open Mens 4×1500, 15:31.51 (Adam Pyke, Alex Rowe, Peter Bol & Luke Mathews)
Under 17 Mens 4×800, 8:34.57 (Luca DiConza, Josh Collins, Tristan Day, Thomas Scroggie)
Under 18, 19 & 20 Mens Medley Relay (Marcus Osman, Phil Borg, Thomas Scroggie & Josh Collins)
25… as in years the Mens Open 4×1500 Club Record had stood for, dating back to 12/12/1992
41.95… as in the new Mens Open 4x100m Relay club record that was the time run twice to the hundreth of a second in the heat and again in the final.
30,400…as in metres raced by SKAAC athletes on the day in the various races and finals that we contested.
Thanks to all athletes, parents, coaches for your input on this sensational day for the club. A special thanks to those athletes that went above and beyond to assist me and the various teams.
To the Under 16 boys who each ran 3 races (Adam McGarry & Matt Dinan)
To the Under 16 girls medley who did the club proud (Eva Williams, Charli Williams, Lulu Goodman & Isabelle Collins)
To the Under 14 mens relay team finishing strongly against the odds (Sam Cantwell, Aidan Leiner, Jett-Paris Bedelis & Michael Dinan)
To Jackson Jacotine who came to be a part of the day and then raced off to a basketball game
To Andrew Mathieson who ran two sensational legs in the Under 16 4×100 and a particularly impressive leg of the Under 16 4×400.
To Angus Down who ran two 400m races in a day.
A great day, and a pleasure to witness such a strong performance by everyone wearing our famous colours.
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