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Saturday, April 28, 2018

2018 Shaw Baton Relay Battle Hill Pautahanui Sat 28 April






Team Results
Individual Results 


The Shaw Baton is probably my favourite cross-country race.  It has everything – grass, single track, gravel road, hurdles, water obstacle, uphill, downhill and a flat run in a for a fast finish. It is also a relay which makes racing that much more exciting.

It is also the place where typically you can get to see the new talent clubs have managed to recruit and speculate how this might impact on the rest of the season. 

And yes that was Liam Back breathing down the neck of Hamish Carson at the pond on lap 1 in the last race of the day.

This year the only major difference from previous years was the reduction of laps from 5 to 4 for the last race which includes the senior men, master’s men and men U20. 

Not only does the race become shorter in terms of time but it makes it much more competitive. 

It increases the chances that wins in this grade might be shared across different clubs and not be dominated by a single club.  

And theoretically a club can put together more teams with less numbers required to make a team.


The place to be for spectators is always at the pond. 

I shoot there because the light is good and because there is a better chance of getting a greater variety of action shots.

And yes sometimes people fall over and get a dunking.  But that is nothing I incite – you can blame this on the local “tricoteuses”, who taking a leaf out of their French Revolution counterparts were the people (mostly women) who sat in front of the guillotine and jeered and cheered as the executions took place.  


Trainee pond hecklers
To pass the time between each execution they knitted. 

And a couple of observations from the day:

The forecast rain stayed away until the end

Is Maria Williams the first blind person to run a local or even a national cross country race?

How the numbers of members for the Victoria University Club continue to grow. Is that your doing Dan Hunt?

Looks like Alec McNab at Whanganui Collegiate School loaned Don Dalgliesh two of his star runners (Liam Back and George Lambert) for the Scottish Men's Under 20 A team. 










































































































































































































































































Race 2 Photos (Kids Run for Fun)





























































Race 3 Photos 






































































































































































































































































































































Race 4 Photos (some photos could not be processed because if a faulty CF card)