Ellis Wins by a Whisker

Moe’s Half Marathon

Horham tri-athlete and marathon runner Susie Ellis withstood the relentless charge of Ray Scott by the narrowest of margins to score her second Stawell Amateur Athletic Club win for the season, when she took out the inaugural Moe’s Half Marathon, held last Saturday along the banks of Horsham’s Wimmera River.

Cold showery conditions didn’t dampen the enthusiasm of the 36 senior runners who lined up for the start, with 18 opting for the full 21km handicap race, while the remainder completed either the 7km or 14km non-competitive events.

Numbers were swelled by a good turn out of Horsham Running Club members, with quite a few tackling the full course distance.

Once again the race was run as a sealed handicap, with all runners starting together, and handicaps applied after the race. Being the longest event of the season, the extra distance was always going to favour the fitter runners, with Susie Ellis, John Dugdale, Ray Scott and Peter Steggall showing good form early on.

Col Barnett made a cautious start, and cranked up the pace midway through the race, but left his run too late to finish in the placings.

Early on Dugdale kept Barnett in his sights, but faded over the closing stages, when the distance loving Scott overtook him and looked to have a strong chance heading into the last 5km.

However, when handicaps were applied, Susie Ellis just managed to hang on by 1 second to claim the win from Scott. Gary Howden finished 31sec behind in third place, having finally managed to break free of Mark Pumpa, after a race long duel.

Col Barnett took out line honours and ran the fastest time of 81min 7sec, with Susie Ellis posting the best female time of 96min 57sec.

Quickest invitational runner was Richard Goudie in 96min 57sec.

The cold, wet conditions reduced the junior field to 5 runners. Alastair Dugdale, Nat Watson and Thomas Blair all attacked the 4km course from the start, but the flat conditions suited Thomas Blair who scored a comfortable win from Dugdale, with Emily Parnaby running well for third.

Fastest junior time was 15min 8sec set by Dugdale, with Parnaby running the fastest girls time of 16min 57sec.

The sub-juniors ran a 2km out and back course, with 3 of the 4 girls in the race filling the first 3 placings. Georgia Barnett notched up her second win for the season with sister Elly not far behind in second place. Elly Atherton put in a good effort to come third.

Liam Scott ran the fastest sub-junior time of 9min 13sec, with Elly Barnett the fastest sub-junior girl in 10min 41sec.

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