What a fantastic night we had down at the Warrnambool breakwater with 48 competitors taking part in last night’s Aquathon, a huge increase in numbers compared to the last few years – which is great to see – people getting out there and having a go.
We had an equal mix of individual participants take on the challenge and we had teams of 2 take part which was fantastic to see – friends and family teaming up and tackling the event together.
Kicking off with a 1km beach run followed by a 150m (ish) Swim – competitors repeated this little circuit for a 1 hr period, ticking off as many laps as they could during that time. For our seasoned Aquathon participants, they knew the challenge is to pace themselves early on as to not burn out towards the end – as 60 minutes is a long time out there. Running on the sand always a challenge and I’m sure there will be a few sore legs and calves today.
All 3 categories were very hotly contested with battles on at the front end, with some strong competition coming out of the water on each lap.
Matt Billington a local boy, who was back from Qld for Christmas took out the men’s division with 9 laps followed in by Mark Gavin in 2nd place (bettering his 3rd from last year) with 8 laps who stole it from Sean Ryan who come in third place also on 8 laps. The rest of the placings important for those trying to chase down Ruben for our Club Champion for the year, with members Riley Ontronen, Gavan Cooper and Ian Barnes scoring valuable points.
In the women’s Georgia Page who was home from NSW for Christmas also, took out the win on 8 laps ahead of Rebecca Howell on 8 laps and 9 year old Isla Brandham who did an amazing job for a youngster completing 5 laps to claim third place. Alison Kenna one of our seasoned campaigners who has been with our club for many years now came in 4th place in the ladies event. Well done ladies!
The teams division saw the hard to beat heavy hitters of Luke Taylor (swimming) and Travis Greening (running) into the lead early finishing with 9 laps. Coming in second was Wilson Athletic made up of Darren Smith (swimming) and Ashley Ansell (running) who finished with 8 laps and rounding out the placing was the team of Ben Ontronen (swimming) and Ilana Jorgensen (running) who teamed up at last minute today to complete 8 laps also.
Followed in behind all of these were a lot of happy and satisfied participants – lots of smiling faces and people rapt with how they went on the day. We had lots of youngsters take part and a special shout out and congratulations to them. Hopefully we see them continue on at our next junior events. It was also great to see some club members of past back out there with Jen Bartlett, Angela Cook and Amie Foreman teaming up with friends.
Thanks to everyone who came along to participate in our event and to the support crews watching and giving a cheer on – what a fantastic atmosphere we had!
Thank you to Kate Haberfield for doing a stella job as race director – awesome job, and to all our volunteers who helped with set-up, marshalling (Jade), lap counters (Nicole, Jenny, Pete V), cooking the BBQ (Andy, Andrew and Diana, taking photos (Kathy) and those who helped with packing up. Thanks also to the Warrnambool Surf Life Saving Club for their assistance with water safety helping to make sure everyone felt comfortable in the water. Cheers guys! And a special shout out to Bakers Delight Warrnambool CBD for helping us out with bread for our BBQ fundraiser – the snags in bread were a hit with those refueling after the event.
Great job everyone and we hope you all enjoy your time in Warrnambool if your on holidays – and if your local, or feel like another road trip we hope to see you at our next events – the blue hole mini series on the 9th, 16th and 23rd January – before our major event for the season the Foreshore triathlon on the 9th Feb. Jump onto our website
www.warrnambooltriclub.com for all the details and to register.
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