RowangLive2: 2018 Wellington Road Champs Wainuiomata Sat 18 Aug

Saturday, August 18, 2018

2018 Wellington Road Champs Wainuiomata Sat 18 Aug

Malcolm Hodge follows in brother Tim's footsteps and wins 10k road title

Malcolm 10 years ago at Road Champs, CIT Trentham

Results
Results from 2017

Malcolm Hodge wins the Senior Men’s Wellington Centre 10km Road Champs race. Well, I never saw that coming.

In fact my money would have been on Nick Horspool with Tim Cornish as the surprise package (where has he been by the way?).

A big field and a fast start and they were away.

At the bottom of the course at the start of lap 2, Stormin’ Malcolm led them around the tight turn.

At this stage of the race the lead pack was made up of 8 runners - Malcolm, #Mad Harry, Isaac Murphy, Matt Taylor (Hastings), Niam MacDonald, Rowan Hooper, Nick Horspool and Brian Garmonsway.

At the start of lap 3 the lead group was down to 6 with Harry and Rowan dropped off. Niam was now making the pace in front with Malcolm and the others just on his heels.

On the last lap Niam was still in command with Isaac, Malcolm and Nick still breathing down his neck.

Niam and Malcolm must have made their move on the final 1.25km with the finishing order between these two only decided in a sprint to the finish with little separating them.

So Malcolm picks up his first centre title and no doubt confirms his place in the Scottish A Team for Akaroa?

In the women’s race the field was more spread out with Maiya Christini 1st, Nicole Mitchell 2nd and Tina Faulkner 3^rd. This order stayed intact until the finish.

Observations:

The turn at the bottom of the course is insanely tight. It must be tricky for runners to slow on the turn and then try and regain pace and rhythm.

There is no reason why the Boys and Girls U13 & U15 grades could not be one race rather than two. The distances are the same.

The results show some excellent times in the 10k. In the senior men's grade 4 went under 31.30 which is pretty good. I bet there were lots of PB's.

Malcolm Hodge's winning time of 31.06 was the same as Scott Russell's winning time in 2017. Freaky!

The Wall brothers from Fielding (Ben and Liam) chose to run the U18 5km course at Wainuiomata rather than the Manawatu-Wanganui champs which offered a 6km race for the Men's U18 grade. Ben Wall was first across the line at Whynui but is ineligible to pick up the centre title which goes to Will Anthony.

It seems that each centre can determine the distances for its championship events. Ideally these should be the same as the distances set for national events but don't have to be. So for Wainuiomata the distances offered are determined by the 2.5km out and back. Which is why the Men's U20 was only 7.5km rather than 8km and the Men's U18 was 5km rather than 6km.

Will Critchlow (VUW) DNF'd because of a potential injury risk. He is holding out for the mile race at the Scottish Night of Miles to be held at the Basin Reserve in December.

Purple coloured racing flats?

Some of the photos below were subtlety photobombed