Down in wonderful South Australia, Adelaide hosted the first six day ultra in God knows how long (will need to check with the statos to see when the last one was). Regardless, kudos to Ben Hockings and his team from Ultra Runners South Australia for having the balls and patience to stick on an event of this magnitude. It’s no easy feat to be ever-present for six days as a race director, not to mention the logistical undertaking of ensuring you have the right amount of vollies helping out too.
In the end, 19 brave ladies and gents took to the certified 1,430m cement track with Darren Linney crowned as the inaugural winner. He ran a total of 800.959km across the six days, with Annabel Hepworth taking out the ladies win with 742.803kms and with that, the longest distance (yet to be officially confirmed) for a female in a six day event in the world this year! David Billett took third overall with a total distance of 677.945km.
Special mention also to John Timms, who has provisionally set a new 75-79 yo male age group 500km National Record in 5D:22:40:41. The previous record was held by Drew Kettle, and was set in 1996 in 6D:15:18:51 at Nanango, QLD.
Sri Chinmoy 105km
In a very different form of race, the Sri Chinmoy 105km event took place in Canberra yesterday. Brendan Davies quite literally smoked the entire field, setting a new course record in 9hrs 38mins. the ever-strong Pam Muston took out the ladies title, winning in 13hrs 44mins. Male and female podium places below:
Ladies
- Pam Muston – 13hrs 44mins
- Liz Quade – 14hrs 13mins
- Deb Livermore – 15hrs 44mins
Men
- Brendan Davies – 9hrs 38mins (new record)
- Mick Thwaites – 11hrs
- Chris Buchanan – 11hrs 51mins
