Lawlor and Johnson Take 10km Each

By Brian Marantelli 28 July 2019

With the half way point of the winter season upon us the Victorian Cross Country League contested the 10km road race around Albert Park Lake on the 14^th of July. With a few members unavailable the Division 3 team put in a great effort to finish second to the division leader Mornington Peninsula. We currently hold second on the ladder and with plenty of racing to go we are close enough to challenge for the title. Division 6, also down on numbers, battled on strongly to also finish second to Doncaster, the result making little difference to the overall table as the Victorian Cross Country league hold a healthy lead on the 2019 ladder. The VCCL were unable to field teams in Division 7 or the Women’s but managed a credible fourteenth (in a field of fifty five) in the highly competitive over 40’s male competition. The club’s sealed handicap conducted at Albert Park went to Daniel Lawlor, winning by an impressive forty eight seconds from Tony Moran and Irene James. Daniel produced the fastest time of the day with a run of 32:49, smashing his previous club best. The Albert Park win was his third with the club and came on the back of an extremely narrow second at Sandown to Irene James.

Race twelve on the VCCL calendar was the time honoured Eric Greaves Memorial 10km at Braeside Park. The sealed handicap is held in conjunction with the Victorian Masters and celebrates the contribution that Eric made to both running organisations. This season’s winner was evergreen Russell Johnson who was able to hold out the ultra consistent Carl Kennedy and Fiona Ely. Russell’s time of 45:17 enabled him to have a comfortable margin of fifteen seconds at the finish. Russell, certainly classed as a “running nomad”, has travelled far and wide to compete at locations and tracks that many of us would never have heard of, let alone ventured to. Russell has currently competed at 145 different parkrun venues, amongst his 187 parkrun events. Daniel Lawlor (34:30) continued on with his excellent 2019 winter season with the fastest run of the day.

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