A very enjoyable afternoon at the Road Relays out at Nundah. Thanks in particular to those who helped out with the Barbeque, in particular to Ken Stacey and to everyone who participated. Times for the 4.8k were as follows:

Women’s Team:

 Hubertien Wichers 18.07

 Rachel Effeney 17.46

 Lydna Bateson 24.43

Men’s Open Team:

 Osman Saleh 16.15

 Connor Stanton 19.35

 Tony Usher 17.40

Masters No. 1 Team:

 Paul Jackson 16.00

 Ron Peters 16.15

 Don Wallace 16.49

Masters No. 2 Team:

 Alastair Wallace 21.03

 Geoff Crowther 21.46

 John Purcell 20.39

Thanks

 John

November is still classified as ‘spring’, but the hot conditions this year definitely did justice to the name ‘Summer’ Challenge. At times gravel was sticking to running shoes and in places the tar was melted. The mid day criterion in Warwick was particularly hot, with a few runners having the wobbles at the finish line.

Andrea

The clear winner this year was the Victory Sports’ team, with no close rival to challenge them this year. It was still an exciting competition, with the mixed team trophy (minimum of 6 women) up for grabs.  It  was won by the Bushies the last two years, but Intraining  got a good team together and beat us this year, giving the Bushies an extra challenge for next year.

Neil Labinsky kept the Bushies honours high by having a fantastic run down the range from Toowoomba and recapturing the Robin Hood trophy, which is awarded to the fastest male runner down the range; this is about the 6th time Neil won this trophy, so the team is very proud of him!

The strength of the Bushies team is that it consists of a core of runners from the Ashgrove Rangers and friends, who come back every year. This is great for the team spirit and experience, so new people fit into the team easily.

Russell's Bushies Team 2009

This year, Russell had handed over the management of the team to his son in law Grant Coleman, who did an excellent job in organising the event for the team, ensuring for a smoothly run weekend with a minimum of last minute panic.

Though, a good relay never goes without a last minute shuffle of a runner into the water vehicle and to get him/her to the change over point. This year Kelly made it with only 20 seconds to spare to tag Neil.

Another highlight of the weekend was the American team called the ‘Yankee Pilots’ who won the team spirit trophy. It consisted of 10 service men and women from Florida who are temporarily stationed in Guam. They were over here for a couple of weeks for training and decided that the summer challenge was a good way to spend their spare weekend. Everyone was in awe to see how they worked through the weekend, in great spirit, running the criterions as a team and taking it relatively easy, (good strategy when you only have 10 runners) while many other teams had twice the number of runners. The best thing was that they did not come last!

Yankee Pilots

We’ve already started training for next year! And while current members of the team have priority to be on next year’s team, if you are interested to run for the Bushies, we can take your name and contact details. Just contact Hubertien (0404 922 577)

By Russell Adams

My first experience with the Endeavour Foundation 500km Summer Challenge was in 1999 when I was lucky enough to run with the “Bushrangers” team. This team consisted of runners who were far quicker than I was, so I was limited to the minimum number of runs allowed per runner. I was currently averaging 4:30min/km in my races but during the event this suddenly decreased to 4:15min/km. due to the “can’t let the team down” attitude.

Having experienced 3 days of the most incredible racing and experience of a lifetime I thought that I should share this experience with other members of Ashgrove Rangers Athletics Club who were quite young and not yet at the level expected of the top “Bushrangers” team. So in August 2000 I formed a second “Bushrangers” team consisting of the younger athletes and supplemented by friends and work mates with a mixture of recreational runners and ex-footballers. As there were now two “Bushrangers” teams, my team was given the name of “Russell’s Bushies” to differentiate between the two. We came seventh out of fourteen teams and you would have thought we came first as everyone cheered so loudly when we found out where we had come.

I have now been team manager of “Russell’s Bushies” for 8 years and have found it a most rewarding experience. Young athletes have matured and I have seen them grow and develop over the years. The composition of the team has changed and is mainly young athletes now with only a few older runners. Just watching them as the 500 approaches is a real experience. They get extremely excited and talk of nothing else. What I have done is set up the framework for them to have fun and compete within an excellent team environment. I emphasise participation and team members are encouraged to compete to the best of their ability. I don’t care what pace they run at as long as they are prepared to give their best. I don’t deliberately try to recruit faster runners and team composition only changes due to unavailability of current members (which does occur each year).

So what is the 500 all about? All teams are competing and doing their best. The top teams are obviously competing to win, but all teams are there to enjoy their running in one of the greatest events of the running calendar. Looking around over the 3 days you see runners of all ages and abilities but the common denominator is that we all like to compete and run. The event is also a learning experience. You learn a lot about yourself and your interaction within a team. You suddenly find your performance increases as the “team” spirit invades you. Over the years I have seen incredible performances from people who were not prepared to give in and fought hard and tough to the very end.

I would recommend the 500 to any runner who wants to experience one of the most incredible running events of their life.

What a patriotic show from Ashgrove Rangers members at the Road Running Championships on Saturday 15th August.  There were 5 teams competing overall.  Congratulations to the open mens team comprised of Paul Tierney, Chris Adams and Wayne Heath who came second behind Toowong Harriers. Other teams placed 5th, 8th, 13th and 15th in the open mens event.

Well done to all the Ashgrove Rangers competing yesterday in the 10km State Championships held at Noosa.

Some of the results:
Daryl Crook: 4th place overall in 31:57
Paul Tierney: 33:57
Ben Shaw: 34:26
Chris Adams: 35:51
Grant Coleman: 37:57
Peter James: 40:49
Leigh Coleman: 45:55
Geoff Crowther: 46:37
John Purcell: 51:07

Excellent Work!

Well done Don Wallace (2:35), Rina Hill (2:48) and Paul Jackson (2:48 see picture) at the Gold Coast Marathon!

The GCM also hosted the State Marathon Championships in which both Don and Rina achieved silver.

To all Ashgrove Rangers competing in Gold Coast Marathon events tomorrow: have great, successful race, and enjoy it!