Photos by Luke Hemer, courtesy of Stawell Gift
Harrison Kerr produced a once-in-a-generation performance to emphatically win the 2022 Powercor Stawell Gift on Easter Monday.
Kerr won by 0.16 seconds from Hamish Lindstrom (7.75m) in a time of 11.85s from his mark of 9.25m. The run was the fastest winning time since 1995.
Jesse McKenna (6.25m) was third in 12.17 seconds, with scratch marker Eddie Nketia fourth in 12.27s.
Kerr’s performance on the wet Stawell track was almost 4% faster on a ‘rate per metre’ measure than he ran at last year’s Gift or any time since then (except for his Stawell heat and semi this year). He also had a mark one metre more generous this year (9.25m this year compared to 8.25m last year). Part of that difference was a 0.5m ‘lift’ in his handicap under a Victorian Athletic League policy of rewarding athletes who are already performing better than their peers, when they win a lead-in event. In Kerr’s case, this was the Maribrynong Gift last month, which he won by 0.14 seconds.
“He just kept getting faster and faster at training,” said Kerr’s coach, Nick Fielder, who also coached last year’s winner, Ed Ware.
“He surpassed what I expected him to do, he ran out of his skin and I wasn’t expecting that. I can’t fault a thing he did and he is an absolute joy to coach.”
The women’s Gift was a more befitting display of the concept that pro running should produce a close contest. In a blanket finish where the entire field was separated by just a tenth-of-a-second Cara Bull (6m) took line honours in 13.75 seconds
“I’m absolutely stoked and lost for words,” said Bull.
“It was such a close race, the other competitors in the final were all truly amazing.”
Clare de Salis (8m) was a close second in 13.79s just ahead of Mia Gross (0.75m) on her 21st birthday, who finished one-hundredth-of-second further behind.
In other events Jacob Despard (0.5m, 12.46s) took out the backmarkers 120m, Brady Threlfall (130m, 4:02.15) the Herb Hedemann 1600m and Georgia Griffith won the women’s 1000m against a class field including Linden Hall, Catriona Bisset and Abbey Caldwell.
Latest posts:
- Old school ties: Marks and Strintzos meet again at Ballarat
Long before either of them was a national record-holder or a sub-61 half marathoner, Haftu Strintzos and Ed Marks and were two Melbourne schoolboys at Wesley College and Haileybury College getting muddy in their school’s cross country program. Marks remembers how those races usually finished. “Haftu… we used to run together back in high school, - Seven for Her, Ten for Him. Athletics’ last unequal event?
When Jim Thorpe won the first Olympic decathlon in Stockholm in 1912, King Gustav V of Sweden reportedly told him: “Sir, you are the greatest athlete in the world.” The title stuck. Steve Ovett, needling his mate Daley Thompson decades later, offered the alternative view: nine Mickey Mouse events and a slow 1500m. Somewhere between - Louison-Roe gets her gold as Australia closes out Eugene with six medalsTwo years ago in Lima, Izobelle Louison-Roe was the surprise. A 17-year-old clearing a personal best 1.89m to take silver behind Angelina Topic, with nothing much expected and nothing much to lose. In Eugene she was the favourite, and that is a very different job. She did it anyway: 1.92m, first attempt, a clean card
- No walk in the park: Beacroft sets World U20 record in claiming goldNine days after Commonwealth gold at Scotstoun — and a night out with the Australian team — Isaac Beacroft has completed the double at Hayward Field, breaking the world U20 record for the 5000m walk. It completes a double almost no one attempts, let alone lands. Nine days earlier the 19-year-old had outkicked Kenya’s Stephen
- Buchanan, Campbell claim City2Surf honoursAndy Buchanan and Holly Campbell have honed their preparations for races later this month by taking out one of the world’s largest running event: Sydney’s City2Surf. Buchanan clocked 40:27 to win the 14km race from Sydney’s Hyde Park to the iconic Bondi Beach, finishing over 30 seconds ahead of Luke Hince. “I really enjoyed that
