Weekly News - 16/10/17

• Great Ocean Walk 100kms Trail Ultra, Vic
• Hume & Hovell Ultra, NSW
• Washpool World Heritage Trails, NSW

The Great Ocean Walk 100kms Trail Run kicked off Saturday morning (October 14) in Apollo Bay, Vic and AURA had 21 members registered to run the event, including 2016 winner Damian Smith. This year the top podium finish went to AURA’s very own Andy Turner in 10:39:37, and while second place was taken out by Campbell Craig (10:45:31), it was another AURA member who finished off the placings – Joel Claxton taking third with a time of 10:56:54.

For the women, big congrats goes out to Nicole Paton, also an AURA member, who took first female in 11:44:48. It was a massive field this year, and we congratulate all those affiliated with AURA who ran in the GOW100s (Dani Andres, Bill Bardsley, Dan Beard, Gayle Cowling, Mark Falls, Ewen Fletcher, Christopher Gippel, Ben Hirst, Gabor Jakus, Oliver Mestdagh, Peter Munns, John Nicola, Nicole Paton, Luke Perraton, Meredith Quinlan, Chris Roberts, Simon Roberts, Damian Smith and Rob Sutton).

The weekend also saw the Hume & Hovell Ultra just south of Tumbarumba, NSW and the Washpool World Heritage Trails in northern NSW.

In a field of 12 in the Hume & Hovell 100-miler, two AURA members came out on top. Stephen Redfern took first place in the men’s and overall in under 20 hours, with a finishing time of 18:42:07 while first female and fifth overall went to Melissa Robertson in 26:06:22. Congratulations to our other competitors, including David Campbell who placed ninth in the 100kms (14:40:34), first place podium finisher Rob Mason in the 50kms event with 5:22:41, and participants Samantha Post, Ness Hartge, Tania Cahill, Maree Doyle, and Stephen Kiley.

Winners in the Washpool World Heritage Trails in the 50kms event were: First place for the men was Blake Turner with a new course record of 3:58:11, second went to Mike Carroll (4:19:47), and Oskar Booth took third (4:20:38). For the women it was Hannah McRae (4:40:18) in first place, Deb Nichol took second in 5:03:04, and third was claimed by Clare Palmer (5:03:10).

It was another action packed weekend of ultra running; well done to all our AURA members who ran and did their best.

Pictured: Podium finishers of the Great Ocean Walk 100s on Saturday including Andy Turner, Campbell Craig, Joel Claxton, Nicole Paton, Madeleine Oldfield and Bec Howe. Image - Facebook.