Monday 30 November 2009

drawing on every resource

Posted by speedygeoff on Monday, November 30, 2009 with
"The best laid schemes o' geese an' men
Gang aft agley"
(whatever “Gang aft agley” means!)


Taken before the presentations. Carol won the short course age standard competition, she was well ahead and couldn't be beaten. Merv and I tied for second after an exciting see-sawing battle all year. I drew on every resource and clawed back enough points just to tie. Good result - I wanted to win but I didn't really want 80 year old Merv to lose! We couldn't have planned it better. We couldn't have planned it full stop.

29/11/09 - Weston Park 3.5k Vets handicap
5 Gary Bowen M50 15:00 75.0% bronze
7 Graeme Patrick M55 16:28 70.9
8 Noeline Burden W55 18:40 72.9
9 Geoff Moore M60 14:34 83.2
14 Rod Lynch M45 13:26 82.1
21 Ken White M55 14:23 80.5
23 Katie Forestier W40 14:29 80.4
24 Cathy Montalto W55 18:01 76.8
35 Neil Boden M55 18:00 66.2
49 Garry Maher M60 19:44 62.1
63 finishers

29/11/09 - Weston Park 7.0k Vets handicap
7 Ruth Baussmann W55 39:16 72.8% bronze
8 Charlie McCormack W40 32:53 72.4
15 Craig Davis M40 35:20 59.7
21 Margaret McSpadden W60 44:05 67.3
27 Rachelle Ellis-Brownlee W35 33:01 69.1
28 Heidi Johnston W35 32:23 71.6
30 Maria O'Reilly W50 34:20 78.6
32 Bronwyn Calver W40 33:08 70.6
37 Alan Duus M60 36:31 68.9
39 Yili Zhu M45 33:24 66.1
40 Helen Larmour W50 32:51 79.4
47 Mick Horan M50 31:25 72.0
48 Miranda Rawlinson W55 39:07 70.5
49 Jodie Davis W40 44:22 53.2
56 Janene Kingston W45 35:18 67.7
70 Roger Pilkington M50 33:16 68.0
73 Troy Steinman M35 28:26 71.4
84 Ewen Thompson M50 42:08 54.8
93 Andrew Matthews M50 50:58 44.4
94 finishers

Vets annual awards:
Long course point scoreTroy Steinman bronze
Short course point score - Ken White silver
Short course age standardGeoff Moore silver
Short Course Mullins trophyGeoff Moore winner! This is awarded to “runners finishing closest to the 50th percentile, as a fitting way to remember Reg Mullins, for although he was a talented long distance runner he rarely finished better than mid-field in most of his seventy-five handicap runs.” – quoted from the November Vetrunner. This supplements me being “officially statistically average” at BBQ Stakes. It’s a wonder I don’t have 2.3 children to round it out!

Just as it would have been impossible to contrive an age standard tie, there is no way a "Mullins" win could be contrived. It's a very random award! You'd have to know how many eligible runners there were in the final race, who of them were still in front of you, and then work out what place you needed to finish, and somehow factor out whoever were ineligible. Not possible. Even allrounder would have trouble figuring out this one!

This week
Monday 30/11 4:30pm Parliament house 8k jog; 5:30pm interval training
Tuesday 1/12 6:15pm Spring Series #5, Weston Park (again!)
Wednesday 2/12 12:15pm BBQ Stakes
Thursday 3/12 6:00pm vets Track
6:00pm 3000m
6:20pm 200m
7:00pm 60m
7:15pm 800m handicap
8:00pm Parlauf Relay
Saturday 5/12 8:00am Pialligo intervals

Note the changes to this Thursday night's program - there was a second 3000m scheduled but it has been cancelled. The Parlauf relay is teams of five totalling 5k altogether, probably with each runner covering 400, then 300, then 200, then 100. It will be a fun way to finish off the night.