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Message from the Chair

Message for the Chair – Mar 2023

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AVOHK RACES – yes, finally we can start planning for Races in 2023. So please read on …

Meantime you can quickly pencil in your diaries from our Events area on this website!

Malcom Phillips 5k

The Malcolm Phillips 5k has been run as a virtual race for the last 2 years and we are excited to announce that it will be back as a physical race on Saturday, 20th May this year, on Bowen Road. It is an age-graded race, which means that runners’ actual finish times will be subject to an age-graded factor (see the Age Grade Factor tables on www.world-masters-athletics.com ). Age-graded times will then be used in the results and to award prizes. This format means that older runners can be competitive against younger runners and it is a great way too for our members to track and compare their own performance over the 5k distance across the years, or even decades. Entries for the Malcolm Phillips will open in April and all information will be available on our website and emailed to members.

Series of 5ks

AVOHK’s very popular 5k Series has a new format this year. As in past years, we will kick off with the Bowen Road 5k, which will be held on Saturday, 9th September. This will be followed 2 weeks later by a 5k race on the traditional Tai Tam course on 23rd September. The Black’s Link race will be held over a 5-mile course on 14th October, and we will finish the series with a relay race at South Bay on 21st October. Full details of the series will be announced on our website soon.

China Coast Marathon and Half Marathon

We will be applying for permits for the China Coast soon and will announce full details of the race next month.

HKAAA MEMBERSHIP

With HKAAA organising more track, road and trail races this year, it is a good idea to make sure that you have renewed your HKAAA membership. As an affiliated club, AVOHK gets priority entry into a number of HKAAA races, most notably the Standard Chartered Marathon. We do everything that we can to help secure spots for our members but, every year, we have a number of runners who apply through AVOHK but are ineligible due to their HKAAA membership having expired. Please visit www.hkaaa.com to check your membership status, and renew if necessary.

Elaine Hall
Chair, AVOHK

AVOHK Races

AVOHK 40th Anniversary Club Relay 

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Central Waterfront / 25th February 2023

The AVOHK 40th Anniversary Club Relay was held at the Central Waterfront on 25th February 2023. The race was for teams of 3, running legs of 3 kilometres, out to the Exhibition Centre and back, starting and finishing at Pier 10.

The weather was very kind, providing excellent running conditions, blue skies, cool and sunny.

13 teams lined up on the start line.

The first leg set off at a hectic pace, led away by RetoMerazzi of the Shek O Friday Gang. He maintained the pace and brought his team home in the lead, closely followed by Richard Hall of Chair and Co with Pili Hu of the Three Amigos just one second behind. Peter Hopper belying his years brought The Double Century Club back in fourth place. Close behind Peter was Tasha of The Lady Makes Three, running the fastest leg of the day by a female.

The second leg saw George Gaffney extend the lead of the Shek O Friday Gang, behind them, Steve Hampson ran a stormer and brought The Double Century Club up into second place. The rest of the field worked hard and generally held onto their positions.

On the third leg, Marco Mueller, with the fastest leg of the race, brought the Shek O Friday Gang home in first place with a massive lead of over 6 minutes. Frank Reihm, running out of his skin, with the fourth fastest leg of the day moved The Lady Makes Three up into second place and the first Mixed team to finish. Back down the field, David Woo ran hard and fast to move his team, SP Hop, up to eighth place with the second fastest leg of the day. It was a close-run race to avoid the Wooden Spoon, traditionally awarded to the last team to finish, but despite Ho Hei Ng, Team 138, running his teams fastest leg of the day, he could not catch Charita Mahilhig of The Lost Hikers – 1, who also ran her teams fastest leg of the day, the fifth fastest female on the day.

It was great to see so many new faces at the race, enjoying the excitement of racing and socialising with other club members in an AVOHK event. Hopefully, we will see them all back again for the next AVOHK Club run.

The venue proved to be a perfect location for the race, especially with the added entertainment of the dance troupe and the yoga class, putting us all to shame with their degree of flexibility.

Many thanks to our helpers on the day, John Howes, Norman Hui, John Fowler and Fe Mondala.

The rule with prizes was that no one could win more than one prize, so anyone in the winning teams was not eligible for the Fastest Leg prizes. 

Winning Male Team – The Shek O Friday Gang

Winning Mixed Team – The Lady Makes Three

Wooden Spoon – Team 138

Fastest Leg by a man (other than a team winner) – David Woo, SP Hop

Fastest Leg by a female (other than a team winner) – Elaine Hall, Chair and Co

Spot Prizes – 8th handover – Corinna Kit Mui Wong, Crazy Running Masters

                     18th handover – David Ng, Crazy Running Masters

                     28th handover – Frank Reihm, The Lady Makes Three

AVOHK-40th-Anniversary-Relay-Race-Result-SheetDownload
AVOHK-40th-Anniversary-Club-Relay-Womens-TimesDownload
AVOHK-40th-Anniversary-Club-Relay-Mens-TimesDownload
AVOHK Activities

2023 World Masters Short Course Cross Country Championships

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Bathurst, 17th – 19th Feb 2023

The 2023 World Cross Country Championships were hosted by Australia and held in the old gold mining town of Bathurst, famous for its motor racing circuit. About 3 hours’ drive from Sydney. Athletics Australia and the local organizing committee were responsible for the organization of these World Championships.

Olympian Chris Wardlaw, an AVOHK Life Member and a long-time Athletics Australia official, was not only a director on the organizing committee but also a competitor. A big effort was made to honour and respect the local indigenous culture and they were very much part of the opening ceremony.

One of the unique features of these championships was the introduction of the very first World Masters Short Course Cross Country Championships supported by World Athletics and World Masters Athletics. This comprised a 2-person mixed team relay. One 2k lap each and held on the Saturday and the individual races on the Sunday. For the 70+ age individual category a 4km race (2 laps) and 35 years to 69 years a 6km race (3 laps).

The organizers put on a very challenging and testing cross country course, comprising 2km laps which included steep up hills, fast downhill, a very muddy section and a trip through a local vineyard. A true challenge and not too much time to catch your breath.

Some 220 masters athletes toed the line for the Sunday individual races. A number of former Olympic athletes competed in these masters races, including local Australian running hero Steve Moneghetti who has recently turned 60 years of age and is still in great condition. Steve won the M60 Individual category and also the 50+ mixed relays.

Whilst Hong Kong did not have any masters athletes competing, AVOHK’s very own Chris Wardlaw was representing Australia in the M70 age category and finished a very credible 4th place.

Former AVOHK Member and previous winner of the Malcolm Phillips 5k, Craig Downie representing Australia had a very successful weekend winning gold in the 60+ mixed relays  with his partner and bagging a very hard-fought 5th place in the M60 individual category. Also in attendance as a spectator and looking very fit was AVOHK legend and Life Member John Douma who resides in Phuket these days. Also spectating and supporting the  runners was AVOHK Life Member and current M65 Hong Kong 5k masters track champion Frank McNamara.

All the results, including the main races, can be found here: 

https://world-masters-athletics.com/wpcontent/uploads/2023/02/2023-WMA-Cross-Country-Championships.pdf

Hong Kong did have one Men’s senior representative in the Men’s open category that was Wilson Wong who finished a hard fought 93rd place. Well done to Wilson.

A big thank you to Athletics Australia and the local organizing committee for putting on a wonderful and unique 2023 World Cross Country Championships and hosting the very first World Masters Short Course Championships. 

Clockwise from above:
– Chris Wardlaw driving hard to the finish line
– Chris with M70 winner John Bermingham (2266)
– “Yes, a bit of mud on the course”

Featured photo: Former AVOHK member Craig Downie M60 (2223) battling hard in 6km individual race

Colin Whittington
AVOHK Vice-Chair

Message from the Chair

Message from the Chair – Feb 2023

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FINALLY – RACE RESULTS!

Congratulations to all our AVOHK runners who participated in various events at The Standard Chartered Hong Kong Marathon earlier this month. It was great to see the AVOHK vests back out in the crowd again. Special mention must go to Rachel Sproston who was champion in the Women’s Master 2 category of the half marathon. Rachel was the 10k champion in the same age category at the last Standard Chartered race in 2021. It will be interesting to see which distance she chooses for the next event!

Gi Ka-man has continued to show excellent form and finished in 2nd place in the Men’s Masters 1 Full Marathon. He was also the first Hong Kong runner across the line in a field that included stiff competition from international invited runners. Ka-man is currently Hong Kong’s top-ranked marathon runner and we wish him every success in his overseas races this year.

Committee member Aldo Kriel had a great day out at the Island District Athletics Championships at the end of January, taking golds in the 35+ AG in both the 100m and 200m and breaking the championship records in both events!

Finally, AVOHK life member Chris Wardlaw represented Australia at the World Masters Short Course Cross Country Championships in Australia at the weekend and finished 4th in the M70 AG. You can read a full report of the race in an article by Colin Whittington who travelled down to cheer the runners on.

AVOHK RACES

Our main priority as a club is to provide opportunities to get our runners running. This has been very challenging over the last few years, but we finally have some good news.

Our outline plan for the year is for the ever-popular 5k series to return, with a fresh new format. Details will be announced on our website in due course, but we anticipate that it will run through September and October. We will also be working towards hosting our flagship event The China Coast Marathon and Half Marathon in early-2024.

The Malcolm Phillips 5k was our only race to continue throughout the pandemic in a virtual form and we are planning for it to return as a physical race this year.

Dave Smith has continued to organise a series of fun runs to celebrate our 40th anniversary year and the next one will feature some relay action on the central waterfront this Saturday, February 25. We hope to have some great photos to share from this.

Elaine Hall
Chair AVOHK

Awards and Recognition

Hong Kong 10k Championships

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Vaibhav Bhovarahan’s story

AVOHK Member Vaibhav Bhoovarahan runs his first 10k race in Tin Shui Wai on Jan 8, following the relaxation of COVID curbs

My preparation for the race consisted of training in longer intervals than what I would usually do, such as 4-km intervals. Additionally, on Thursday [Jan 5] which I felt was my last opportunity to run fast, I aimed to run quite quickly, just over my race pace of 8 km. I did this to roughly gauge how my body should feel when I run at this fast pace for the race. This was also a good way to check which stages during the run I had any issues in and if I could do something to prepare for it before race day.

On race day my day started early, taking the first train from Tung Chung to Tin Shui Wai. I took the 706 light rail line for the first time. I arrived at 7:05 to start at 7:45am and felt my heart start pumping. This left me with 30 minutes to warm up. I had never run a 10 km before and had a slight strain in my right Achilles tendon that had been bothering me for the past week, especially on the longer, faster runs.

I remember finishing my warm-up and walking to the starting line 5 minutes before the start time. Since I was classified as an elite runner, I had the privilege of being at the start line, but when I arrived 5 minutes before the start, almost all the runners were already lined up, so I spent those 5 minutes squeezing past people and trying to get as far ahead as possible.

I needed 39 seconds to cross the start line, so I spent a lot of energy in the first few hundred metres making my way through the pack and squeezing through the smallest gaps. Fortunately, the road widened and I was able to overtake many people before the first kilometre and was back among the other elite runners.

From then on, I continued my overtaking, trying to find the group of runners who were my pace or a little faster so I could go with them – it took me half the race to find that group.

But in hindsight, even though I didn’t have the perfect starting position, I honestly think it helped me to be further back from where I was supposed to be. I always felt like I was running faster when I was chasing someone, so it was an advantage for me to constantly have someone to catch up to.

As far as I remember, I wasn’t overtaken once, and I think especially in a 10k race, which for me was the longest race I’’ve ever done, I knew I was going to have mental struggles, but I was never passed and didn’t lose sight of anyone, which motivated me to keep running.

For kilometres 2-8 I was able to maintain a relatively comfortable pace of 3:45 – 3:50/km, which was well below what I had set for myself at the beginning of the race, which was 4:00/km, so I was happy, and to my surprise, I felt good! I didn’t feel like I was out of breath or struggling (even though some pictures said otherwise).

In the last 2 km I could see the finish from across the road and I got ready to push hard, but shockingly there was a slight hill that felt like forever. But I knew that eventually there would be a downhill portion, and so I kept pushing and I flew down the hill, probably because I didn’t have the energy to slow down.

For the last few hundred metres I had to go back up that same hill, and I gave it everything I had for that last kilometre and I crossed the line with a time of 37:34, with my last kilometre being the fastest of all at 3:33/km, but unlike the first 8 km, the last 2 km killed me and somehow I managed to stay on my feet.

For my debut 10 km at which I started in the middle and my goal was 40 minutes, I was very happy with my time even though I didn’t win.

Message from the Chair

Message from the Chair – Jan 2023

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Happy New Year and Kung Hei Fat Choi!

The running scene in Hong Kong looks set to resume with a number of races being launched. If you haven’t already done so, now is the time to make sure that your AVOHK and HKAAA memberships are up-to-date. AVOHK annual membership runs from January till December and can be renewed through the “Membership” tab on our website at a cost of $150, or $75 for those over 60. Alternatively, the single payment of $1,000 for life members is a great deal and there is no need to renew this annually once you have signed up. For regular runners, membership of AVOHK pays for itself as it allows discounted entry to all AVOHK races, as well as heavily-subsidized social events. By also registering as an athlete with HKAAA, you then become eligible for priority club entry to HKAAA events, such as the Standard Chartered Marathon. Many of our junior runners compete regularly in HKAAA track and field meets. HKAAA membership is separate to AVOHK membership and can be processed through their website at www.hkaaa.com. This needs to be renewed annually in order to be eligible for priority entry.

AVOHK Anniversary Relay

Following the success of our anniversary runs at the end of last year, we will be holding another relay race on February 25th at Central Waterfront. The emphasis is on fun and is free to all members, but you can also rope in a couple of friends to make up a team. Full details can be found at www.avohk.org.

Finally, I would like to wish the very best of luck to all AVOHK runners who will be racing in the various distances at the Standard Chartered Marathon next month!

Elaine Hall
Chair AVOHK

AVOHK Activities

AVOHK 40th Anniversary Relay Race

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The AVOHK 40th Anniversary Relay Race will take place on the Hong Kong Central Waterfront – Saturday 25 February at 3pm.

The competition will involve teams of 3 runners, teams can be all male, all female or mixed and must include at least one AVOHK member and one runner as old as AVOHK (40 years of age) or older.

The running order can be decided on the day of the race.

All runners must be 16 years of age or older.

The race will start, finish and the relay leg handovers take place at Pier 10 on the Central Waterfront, running east, turning at the Exhibition Centre, covering a total distance of 3 km.

Each team will be given a wrist band to hand over between the legs.

Entries limited to 20 teams.
Prizes will be awarded to the first teams to finish in each category (depending on the entry).
All runners will receive an AVOHK 40th Anniversary Commemorative T-shirt.

Entry fee: Free.
Send entries by email to: avohk40@gmail.com

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香港元老田徑會 40 週年接力賽將於香港中環海濱舉行。參賽隊伍由 3 人組成，可以 全男、全女或混合，而必須包括至少 1 名香港元老田徑會會員及 1 名與香港元老田徑 會同齡(40 歲)或以上的隊員。

起跑次序可在比賽當天決定。 所有參賽者必須年滿 16 歲。

起點、終點及接棒區均設於中環海濱 10 號碼頭。參賽者向東跑至香港會議展覽中心折 返，全程 3 公里。

每隊將獲發一條手帶，用來接棒。

名額只限 20 隊。 每個組別首支完賽的隊伍(取決於參賽隊數)將獲頒獎品。 所有參賽者將獲贈香港元老田徑會 40 週年紀念 T 恤。

報名費: 全免
請將報名表電郵至: avohk40@gmail.com

Entry-Form-ENCN-25.2.23Download
Message from the Chair

Message from the Chair – Dec 2022

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As the year draws to a close, the focus for many masters athletes in Hong Kong in 2022 has been on the track rather than the road. The reopening of Scheduled Premises, such as sports grounds, has made it relatively easier to organise events within these premises, while permits and exemptions for road races have still proved elusive. The recent announcement that The Standard Chartered Marathon is able to increase its entry field slightly gives us some hope that things can change in 2023. Now is a good time to make sure that your AVOHK and HKAAA memberships are up-to-date in order to give yourself the best chance of getting on start lists in 2023!


7th HK Masters Track and Field Championships
Congratulations to the AVOHK team who took part in the meet at Tin Shui Wai earlier this month. Our women finished 5th overall and our men were 6th out of all the clubs participating. We had many verystrong performances and special mention must be made of members Lau Hoi-lam who was the overall champion in W35-39 and dominated the field events. Yau Tsui-fun was the overall champion in W45-49 and broke the 400m record in the process! Full results can be found at www.pacers.org.hk.


2023 World Masters Short Course Cross-Country Championships
We don’t yet have any Hong Kong representatives for the event which will take place on 18-19 February 2023 in Bathurst, Australia. There are full details on the AVOHK website and any questions should be addressed to Colin Whittington, who is planning to attend the event, at vice-chair@avohk.org.


2023 World Masters Athletics Indoor Championships, Torun
With the recent easing of travel restrictions, Hong Kong will be sending a strong team to The World Masters Athletics Indoor Championships in Torun, Poland. There is a great website with all the details at https://wmaci2023.com. The deadline for entries is 31 January 2023, so there is still time to enter and
any athletes who were born before 26 March 1988 are eligible. Hong Kong has a great tradition of sending large delegations to these overseas meets. If you have any questions about the meet, you can contact Bill Purves at billpurves@alum.mit.edu.


I hope that you all have a lovely time over the festive period. We look forward to seeing you in 2023.

Elaine Hall, Chair AVOHK

AVOHK Activities

AVOHK 40th Anniversary Team Race

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The AVOHK 40th Anniversary Team Race was held at Wan Chai Gap on Saturday, 17th December 2022.

Cold and blustery weather together with the tough course did not deter the runners from having a good pre-Christmas run.

The race format allowed mixed or all male/female teams, with the men running 6k and the women 5.4k.

The teams started in waves, the first runner on the gun, followed by the second runner after 60 seconds then 30 seconds later the third runner followed by the fourth after another 30 seconds. The team position being decided by the position of their last man home.

The winning team was an all-female team made up of AVOHK stalwart, Cheng Pui Ling Pauline, Cheng Siu Lai, Chan Yu Ki and Han Wing Yee, who finished in a line with a wild celebration. Following them home was Chris Woo for Team 5, closely chased by Team 4, with Catherine Leonard, Sue Mulley, Sheila Purves and Phil Booth, finishing in second place. The remaining members of Team 5, Frank Riehm, Philip Chan Chak Chan and Derek Irwin then came home to claim third place. Team 1, David Wan, Victor Mok, Terence Chan and Eddy Yu, split Team 2, Yuen Ling Choi Leon, Fung Wai Kuen Thomas, Lo Chi Hung and Yan Tung Leung to finish fourth, leaving Team 2 in fifth place.

In true Christmas spirit all the runners received a Christmas prize and an AVOHK Anniversary t-shirt.

Everyone went home happy, looking forward to the next AVOHK event early in the New Year.

Results

Congratulations to all who joined!

AVOHK News

John Wakefield RIP

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Sadly, John Wakefield one of the early members of AVOHK in the 1980’s and a very active runner during that period, has passed away in Hong Kong at the age of 84 after a long battle with cancer.  The picture displays many of the races John took part in.

His most famous exploit in the 1980’s was racing a tram from from Kennedy Town to Shaukeiwan and back.  He won.

Our thoughts and prayers are with his beloved wife and AVOHK supporter, Edith.  John RIP.