Athletics Wollongong held its annual awards presentation evening last Saturday which was keenly attended by 155 athletes and their families and friends.
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The theme of the evening was participation. President Mike McClelland listed the enormous number of events club members competed in over the last shortened season, ending with 30 of the club's open, para class and juniors competing in the Australian Open and Junior Championships.
The club is indebted to the regional little athletics clubs who have shared some great and keen athletes who have reached the under 12 age class, allowing them to access Athletics NSW clubs. The skill set and dedication of these young folk is inspirational and is one of the main reasons as to why the Illawarra is rapidly developing into quite a regional powerhouse in athletics.
This influx of new talent saw 39 records broken, some had been set many years ago.
Top of the list was Carolyn Hunt with 11 new or broken records, followed by Rodney Tebbutt with seven. William Tyler finished with five, four to Olivia Sivills, and three each to Tia Hatchan, Miller Siasat, Delta Amidzovski and Aaron De Jager.
The club's participants at the national championships were Ashleigh Goncalves, Calem Brown, Callum Rann, Charlize Colwell, Chelsy Wayne, Delta Amidzovski, Ella Hewitt, Emily Benefiel, Eve Way, Grace Costabile, Harry Keat, Holly Rea, James McPaul, Jett Link, Kailee Moore, Karen Clarke, Lara Check, Loen Sevastos, Lucas Campbell, Mackay Jones, Maiya Hewitt, Mitchell O'Neill, Naomi Gibson, Olivia Sivills, Patrick Mitchell, Rosie Boyland, Susie Seitaridis, Tayissa Buchanan, Tierney Dunne, William Willis, Zaniah Hourigan Carrera and Zoe Daniels.
On Saturday night, exceptional awards were given to the following athletes:
Most Outstanding Youth Athlete: Delta Amidzovski. Most Outstanding Masters Athlete: Rebekah Power. Most Outstanding Para Athlete: Charlize Colwell. Most Outstanding Track Athlete: Holly Rea. Most Outstanding Field Athlete: Chelsy Wayne. President's Award: Maiya Hewitt. Ron Bragg Club Spirit Awards: Swinbourne family - Mal, Paula, Alistair and Tristan. The Pinch Trophy for Club Person of the Year: Olivia Sivills.
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Three members of super coach Donna Hiscox's squad - Mitchell O'Neill, James McPaul and Michael Doodson - also recently went to Stawell to compete in several races as part of the Stawell Gift program.
Masters runner Doodson competed in the open class Bill Howard handicap program over 100m. He was fourth in his heat with 11.483s, narrowly missing out on the semis.
McPaul's best was an overall 10th in the WH Earle handicap over 550m. He tarted off the 25m mark and finished with a time of 1.13.970s.
Meanwhile, O'Neill had better luck in the Bill Howard 100m program, finishing first in his heat and semi-first, before powered up in the final to finish a narrow second in a time of 10.581s from a 4.25m handicap.
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