Three athletes from Coburg represented the club at the Athletics Victoria All Comers Meet held last Saturday, 17 March 2007. The meet provided invaluable race practice ahead of the AV Shield North West Region Finals to be held the following week at the Newport Athletics Facility in Williamstown.

Adrianna Crea kicked off proceedings with first place in the 2000 metre Walk. Crea is in heavy training at the moment and during the week had starred at her school athletics, placing in the 1500 metres.

This contributed to a time that was slightly off the pace Crea had been setting for this event throughout the course of the season. After a very fast first lap, in which she received a caution, Crea was unable to maintain the pace and dropped off her goal pace over the last two laps to finish in a gutsy 13:26.

The next event on the program for your Coburg Harriers was the 800 metres, featuring Summer Vice-Captain Jeremy Grey and Summer Captain and Club President Chris Harrap.

Grey was first up. A steady first lap – going through in 65 seconds – and Grey had moved into the lead group. The pace picked up, with Grey content to let the lead runner set the pace, until with 100 metres to go, Grey showed a clean pair of heels to stride out very strongly and finish in first place. It was a season’s best time of 2:10.9 and his quickest time over the last two seasons.

In the next heat was Chris Harrap. After a very quick first lap of 72 seconds, Harrap was on 2:25 pace. After such a cracking pace, Harrap was not able to maintain the fast start, but regardless came home in 2:43.10. While disappointed with his second lap, Harrap can take heart from the fact that this was a season’s best time by seven seconds! Bring on the Region Final!

After a break of forty minutes from the 800 metres, both Grey and Harrap fronted up for the 3000 metres. Such was the quality of the field, that the first heat was for runners able to run 9:30 or better, the second heat for runners able to finish in under 10:30, and the third heat was for runners expecting to record over 10:30.

While this was being sorted out, the women’s 200 metres were being conducted. Adrianna Crea was placed into a heat for sub 29 second sprinters, with Crea’s season best of 33.29 recorded at Coburg in Round 9 of AV Shield competition. Nevertheless this did present an opportunity for Crea to try to get dragged through to improve on her personal best. Again, the heavy training workload told on Crea and she finished in an encouraging 34.6 seconds.

The 3000 metre fields had been set and Grey opted for the second heat. A shocking start saw Grey boxed in and placed in the middle of the field. An attempt to break clear with four laps to go saw the pack quickly close up again. However with a kilometre to go, Grey started to move through the field to cross the line in 9:41.2 and finish with fifth place. In the same heat was national 800 metre runner Madeleine Papp, who placed at the recent national championships. She would win a handicapped celebrity sprint event at a professional running meet in Glen Waverley the following day, against the likes of Adrian Mott and Tamsyn Lewis.

Chris Harrap was in the next heat, attempting his second 3000 metre race for the summer. In an encouraging sign for the coming winter cross country season, Harrap finished in 13:30.7, and will have benefited from the day’s hard workout.

Event                      Name                         Result

200 metres               Adrianna Crea             34.6              

800 metres               Jeremy Grey                2:10.90

800 metres               Chris Harrap                2:43.10         

3000 metres             Jeremy Grey                9:41.20

3000 metres             Chris Harrap                13:30.7         

2000 m Walk           Adrianna Crea             13:26.0