Runners lace up for 39th Redwoods relay

GET SET GO: Runners take off at the start of a previous Red Stag Redwoods Forest Relay. PHOTO/FILE

Athletes will go head to head in the 39th annual Red Stag Redwoods Forest Relay today.The annual event, organised by the Lake City Athletic Club for runners and walkers, is being staged at 10am, starting and finishing on Long Mile Rd.

Last year's overall winners Pakuranga are not returning to defend their title. This leaves the host club, Lake City, and the Hamilton City Hawks as favourites. The Hawks have some talented youngsters in their team and will be pushing the host club for the top spot. However, a team from Tauranga Triathlon Club could produce an upset.

The masters men section looks, on paper, like there will again be a strong tussle for the top grade place between Hawks and Lake City.

Both female sections - open women and masters women - have attracted an extremely small number of teams, with Lake City looking to be the top placer in the open section.

Last year, 39 teams entered the youth section with athletes representing secondary schools and athletic clubs. Unfortunately, the number in this section has dropped dramatically with entries from only 14 teams across the two grades being received. John Paul College is the only local secondary school team attending.

New Plymouth Girls' High School and Tauranga Girls' College, both staunch supporters of the event, return for another year and will face tough competition from the Egmont Athletics quartet and the Feilding Moa team.

The two-person walk section, with each person completing the 4800m lap, has attracted 20 teams. On paper, Egmont Athletics and Lake City look likely to be the top placers.

Two running teams and three walking teams from event sponsor Red Stag Timber have entered.

Overall, 64 teams have entered, well down on the 97 entries received last year, mainly due to the drop in numbers in the two youth sections.

Flooded areas in the Scion Tree Nursery complex have necessitated a course change and this has reduced the previous lap distance of 5000 metres to around 4800 metres. There has also been a need to increase the distance for the youth grade athletes from about 3000m to around 3200m. Because of these changes, no team lap or individual lap records will be broken.

The 4800m participants set off at 10am, followed two minutes later by the youth teams. There will be a prizegiving held adjacent to the Redwoods Visitors Centre and i-Site at about 1pm.

Although there is restricted access along Long Mile Rd and the Redwood Grove during the event, it does not preclude members of the public from the area. The public is welcome to come and watch but will need to take care not to impede the participants' progress.