Athletics Whangarei's winter season started on Saturday when the gun sounded, sending 31 runners took off around the new all-weather track, at Kensington Park. After the circuit on the track, runners continued on the road for a 2.4km course, which they could choose to run once (2.4km), twice (4.8km), three times (7.2km)or four times (9.6km). Club president Ian Babe was thrilled with Saturday's turn-out. "We're delighted really because we've got really good numbers - quite a few of our athletes are elsewhere, for instance, doing the Cape Brett run, and some of them are south as well in an Auckland race," he said. Babe is excited about the prospects for the club over the next few months and next athletics season, particularly as far as the younger athletes who are responding to coaching programmes are concerned. "There are within the club some potentially exciting athletes who are putting their hand up and are wanting to be as good as they can be. Several of them are involved in other sports - team sports - but we're hoping that they will continue to develop their athletics. They're still training with our coaches during the winter and will compete in some of the winter season races," Babe said. In the 2.4km run on Saturday, Lewis Miller headed Estell Tiller and Kate Allen home, followed by Loche Harley, Kabiro Hatfull, Cole Miller, Gordon Johnston, Gillian Michel, Denise Limby, Trudy McKnight, and Val Babe. In the two lap race (4.8km), Brent Lewis ran well to finish 2min 41sec ahead of accomplished masters runner Jim Kettlewell, and well clear of Mark Turner, Anson Clapcott, Pamela Latter, Colin McLeod, Robyn Allen, Delwyn Smith, Gillian Blogg, Jenny Ferris, Beth McLeod and Clasina Van Der Veeken. In the three lap run (7.2km), Tom Andrews beat champion marathoner Richard Blogg and top 800m Ryan Slater, who were followed by Luke Banks-Novak. Mike Gowing, a top masters triathlete and a well-performed masters runner, was the sole athlete to brave four laps (9.6km).
