The 3rd Annual
running of the Ray White Chelsea Gift was held on the 18th December 2010.
For the second year in a row runners faced a moderate southerly head wind, signalling
a difficult task for the backmarkers.
The handicapper's job was complicated this year as there was a
lack of data due to pre-event competition wash-outs. Jonathan Mastorakos and Laura Melatua shared the backmarker honours in the Junior category
(U/6 - U/8), whilst Angus Scott once again found himself off the scratch mark in the Senior group (U/9 - U/16).
Jonathan was narrowly knocked out in the Heats, whilst Angus advanced to the Semi-Final stage
following a
nail biting finish in a run-off decided by just 0.02sec after a tied Heat time,
and
Laura shined making it all the way to the Final of the Junior
category for the second year in a row. The challenges of chasing
a "rabbit" again were displayed, and in spite of the conditions several
athletes effectively recorded Personal Bests by virtue of
running under the benchmark times, these were 18.86/18.92s (Laura
& Jonathan) and
13.15s (Angus) in the Junior and Senior events respectively.
Senior Category
A total of 84 athletes competed in 11 heats progressing thru to
2 semi finals and culminating in the Final.
James Cochrane led the field in the Senior
category event winning in 12.22s, with less than half a second
covering the field from 2nd down to 7th places.
Sarah Jones improved from her 3rd place in the 2009 event to
place 2nd and Daniel Hendricks rounded out the podium finishing
in 3rd place. This year each Club was well represented in the the Final
after a Panthers dominated event last season.
Junior Category
Only 48 competitors registered in the Junior category, with
Hamish Sinclair winning the event. Speedster Jeremy Ockerby
finished in 2nd place off the short mark of 2.0m, and Sam Murray
placed 3rd. Notably Laura Melatua defied her handicap of scratch
and finished in 5th place, beating her previous season 100m PB
by over 1.0sec, a wonderful effort.
