Tara Murray
It was a big weekend for Western Athletics’ Jack Rayner as he added another record to his achievements.
Racing in the 10 kilometre event in Burnie, Rayner broke Craig Mottram’s Australian 10 kilometre road record.
The Olympian won the event in a time of 27.43, 11 seconds quicker than Mottram’s time of 27.54. It’s the quickest time to be run in Australia for 10 kilometres on the road.
Rayner already owns the 10 kilometre track Australian record having broken that earlier in the year.
Locally, Western Athletics athletes were in action in round three of the Athletics Victoria State League.
Western Athletics president Peter Cashin said they delivered our club’s most successful day’s competition since AV started the AVSL division format.
“We currently have a score of 43, 861. It is our highest score, 5470 points above our best ever,” he said.
“There are still some of our results missing and others been queried, so we should get even more points once they are checked by AV.
On the weekend, the club finished third in the premier division behind Diamond Valley and Essendon.
Cashin said given their membership size compared to some of the bigger clubs it was a result to be proud of.
“We had 70 athletes who competed in a total of 152 individual scoring events,” he said.
“These are our best numbers. Based on the current results hub we had 28 athletes do three individual events, 26 do two events and 16 do one event.
“A very creditable seven of our age groups were in the top three for their age group at state level.
“Women’s open and men’s 20 were the best in the state, our open men’s and men’s 16 came second in the state and the women’s 40-plus.“
Among those to win their events included, Rebekah Sutton (open female shot put)., Alijah Canepa (open female hammer throw), Brayden Portelli (open men’s long jump), Jackson Glover (open men’s 100 metre hurdles), Stan Peska (men’s 40-plus javelin and discus) and Frankleen Newah (men’s 18 100 metres).
The club’s 50-plus women’s team won the 4×400 metre relay across the state.
“There are still some of our results missing and others have been queried, so we should get even more points once they are checked by AV.”
Round four is on November 12.
