Race Report Ballarat?

Ddog ( I didn’t realise who you were until now) rather than debate and make accusations on the whingers forum, let's have a chat at Castlemaine, and I'll tell you exactly what happened in that famous 300 final at Ballarat  (60 m out)  it is precisely as I believed happened immediately after the race and the video I have is very clear. I  fully accept responsibility for my part in it.

Given you love to analyse - compare all the performances heat to final in that race and we will discuss your findings at Castlemaine.

I have apologised and I have accepted responsibility as the back marker has a duty of care to look out for slowing frontmarkers. Taken what consequences??!!

This is masters handicapped running, it should be fun ( it is in the POD squad we enjoy the banter and challenge each other, we share and celebrate each others wins and losses - we have fun, and we have over a dozen masters and some more that don’t complete  we could hold our own races for sweep stakes and win more but we love the camaraderie of the circuit.

The main aim is to have fun and to promote life long fitness.

If you run long enough in this sport your day in the sun will come, I am proof of that, at Ballarat last week, after running  masters in the VAL for 20 years, I won my first masters VAL sash and third sash since 2002. I think it was time for my day in the sun, even if others don’t, and we celebrated with the squad and old running mates -  to me, that’s what masters running is about.

Authenticrunning – Tahlia Martin did improve slightly more than Laura too by the way.

As the stewards report clearly said there was improvement from Terang to Ballarat. There was no mention of races in between. I have now done my own research and you are correct.
Laura McDougall’s last run we can clearly see an improvement of (7.09m/s) from St Albans in 3 weeks to Ballarat (7.50m/s) + her handicap at Terang was 6m then Maryborough lifted 10m & ran (7.12m/s) & St Albans lifted 13m which was very similar to Maryborough time. So overall she ran .4 quicker – so my question is WHY was Laura subjected to a re-handicap when Peter O’Dwyer in the 120m Masters wasn’t with same impovement?

In 120m Masters Peter ran (7.87m/s) off 10m at Terang then (8.03m/s) off 11m at Parkdale.
Who gets a 1m lift in the 120m???? with only approx 10 meeting this year with a 100m or 120m Masters, that’s equivalent to 4 lifts holy hell, for most runners at least and it’s not like he is a new runner.
Then runs (8.42m/s) in heat at Ballarat enough to just win his heat off same mark as Parkdale, then runs (8.53m/s) in final.

Mara – In your report research wasn’t so good either. Maybe a little more frothing from the mouth would be better for you – perhaps a cafe latte boost.
Now that I’m out of politics I will have more time to keep you honest.

Some of us have to work obviously as I said I was in a great position to see the race and after viewing the race video block by block it just confirms what I posted initially. Yes and Tom certainly did apologised to Andrew but he didn’t cause the incident, he had his arms taken out and was clearly pushed out of the way. Many people are really upset and disappointed with the lack of action at Ballarat.

So it looks like it’s open slather now for all.

The Stewards and the handicappers need to take a good look at this for future reference, although they have set a very dangerous precedent.

Admin wrote:FAST wrote:
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Ddog it would be nice to have a chat at the next meeting.

But rather than involve the chief steward again, and given you want to throw me under the bus.

I will give you the inside information about the 300 masters at Ballarat the biggest and best masters' race in the world.

As you are well aware, I live in Ballarat, and Ballarat Is our grand final, the best pro meet in Australia. So obviously I had set myself for it, did the peak etc.


Well for a guy who has defended the SAAL system so strongly perhaps Peter, you may need to reflect on your defence of the SAAL system.

Tom Sclanders was disqualified for basically what you just described as “setting yourself.”

Under the SAAL stewarding model, you are not allowed to peak at a major race or as you describe - the grand final. You are expected to peak at every meet, every week. An upwards deviation from previous performances is considered worthy of a DQ. Sorry to tell you this but you would have almost certainly been disqualified under SAAL’s controversial stewarding model.

Hi Admin
 
Most know my views on the best way to effectively Steward.
 
I think the VAL stewards understand that most athletes under best practice / good coaching will peak 3 to 4 times a season and stay up for a couple of weeks, give or take while supporting the circuit when not peaking.  In the VAL you have to compete to move your handicap towards your ceiling- essentially your allocated handicap - a reasonable system, although I think athletes should progress to their ceilings quicker. Weekly participation by athletes is also essential for the VAL to survive.
 
You will see, however, that most athletes are reasonably consistent from PB to peak to peak. Of course, good coaching will see modest, reasonable improvement, and that’s in the spirit of what we do.
 
My support of the SAAL system is the program as a handicapping tool, and to be frank, I have not looked into it as a Stewarding tool.
 
I only visit this site when someone contacts me to let me know that something negative is posted about us.
Unfortunately, 95% of correspondence on this site is bitter and negative, and we prefer other social media.
So I’m not across the detail of the Sclanders case but if his peaks are reasonably consistent with his previous PB’s and he has been sanctioned for that - then that is very concerning and a massive step back.
 
Hence my push for unreasonable, unacceptable PB improvement- most non-masters athletes can return to previous PB form thus have disclosed form, for reasonable comparison after considering tracks and conditions.
 
The old stewarding practice of comparing worst performances to best performances and issuing sanctions is hopefully behind us.

Sorry I’m late to the Party,

Seems interesting that there has been no mention of the 400m Backmarkers winners. I understand peaking for a race and that you can run your very best week in week out but I find it hard to understand how the bloke can win one of the bigger 4’s for the year but can’t make a final in the lead up...last year the story wasn’t dissimilar by the looks of the results but didn’t get the cookies.
Not to mention the 2m lift going into Ballarat, why would an established athlete get 2m in one lift from 26 to 28 after previously breaking 48s off 27m. I’m sure 1m would have been sufficient.