Nelson quintet run away with relay title
Angus Wemyss, from the winning team, hands over to Barney Hoskins at the start of leg three, in Momorangi Bay. Photo Peter Jones.
A band of Nelson runners, appropriately labelled “Runaway Collective”, were clear winners of the 41st Queen Charlotte Relay on Saturday.
Thirty-seven five-person teams completed the race, thought to be the country’s oldest road relay, with runners and walkers beginning at the Bluebridge terminal in Picton, wending their way along the Queen Charlotte Drive and finishing at the Havelock Hotel.
Members of the victorious Athletics Nelson team recorded fastest times on four of the five legs, sitting in fifth place at the end of the gruelling first leg on which Patrick Dravitski, from the Flying Foresters social team, turned in the quickest time, a slick 19 minutes, 23 seconds.
From then on it was Runaway Collective’s race. On leg two Angus Wemyss recorded 29.56, Barney Hoskins covered the third leg in 27.12, Matthew Molony sped over leg four in 21.55 then Noah Lausen brought it home on the final stretch, his time 23.21. Their overall time was two hours four minutes 17 seconds, the second-placed team reaching the finish line in 2.24.50.
This was a local crew, the “Falcon Runners” combination of Will Flynn, Chris McMurtrie, Josh Harrison, Paul Beckett and Todd Nicholas.
Third, and first social team, was the Thomwell Coaching crew of Cat Manson, Jarod Thompsett, Daina Ryder, Stephen Blackwell and Sammie Joyce.
Runaway Collective won the Open Men’s division, Boutique-Fit Runners (Janna Wilkinson, Charlene Wills, Emma McKenzie, Fabia McDonald, Jo Bray) took out the veteran women’s grade, MGC Striders (Lena Bailey, Allyah Senior, Ruby Senior, Brooklyn Robinson-Smit, Natalie Nicholas) won the junior women’s title while Vinarchy Walkers (Pablo Flores Bustos, Bridget Molyneux, Vanessa Joyce, Cristina Machuca, Marilou Quiclet) won the walkers division.
Fastest female leg times. Leg 1: Cat Manson 22.41. Leg 2: Jacinta Rysingen 34.59. Leg 3: Charlotte Tear 37.12. Leg 4: Holly Siemonek 29.10. Leg 5: Sammie Joyce 30.06.
The first relay was staged on September 17, 1982, and had been competed for annually since without a break except for 2020 and 2021 which were cancelled because of the Covid 19 pandemic, and 2022, when it was cancelled due to road safety concerns.