The 2016 100Miler was a survival of the fittest affair with 3 of the first 4 at aid one not making it to the finish. Richard Avery once again was amongst the DNFs and Nathan Fawkes stepping up from the Fun Run tripped and fell leaving a deep gash in his knee. After a long hobble to aid 2 he called it a day. That left Richard Gould out in front and he ran a smart well paced race to take home the chocolates in 20:10. A fast finishing Rob Frietag had self handicapped with 3kg of hair and apologised his way to 2nd place. As he went past both Shaun Kaesler and Ben Harris he chatted for awhile before begging leave to push on a bit quicker. Ben Harris backed up from his 2015 victory to round out the podium with a new PB of just under 21 hours.
In the women’s race Emily Laidley ran the fastest time in 3 years with 22:38 and our only other finisher was Jaqui Clark finishing in 28:30. Other notable performances included Simon Bonnick’s first buckle. In fact it was buckle mania with our first 9 runners going sub 24 hours. Simon bounced back from two DNFs to record his fastest ever finish in 22:47.
We also welcomed our first relay team with a team of ladies including Alicia Harris tackling the 100 miler. The ladies kept Richard honest finishing just 4minutes back in the race for line honours.
In the 50 Miler it was Swiss runner Schneidegger coming from behind to run down Rob Badger. Leaving Oakley Dam together it was Lukas who finished stronger in 8:17 to Rob’s 8:24.Rob worked at the local Karnet prison farm just minutes from the Kingsbury Rd aid station. Rounding out the podium in 8:45 was Bryant Burman. In the lady’s event Martina collected her first of 2 WTF victories in a time of 9:04 closely followed by current 100mile course record hold Beck Hefferon in 9:15. Our 3rd female was Kelly Robinson just sneaking under 10 hours.
Other notable finishers were future winner Nathan Reeves. Nathan remains the only runner to finish 4x. Soon to be 200 mile star Dave Giles and the lovely Belle Kennedy in her only WTF race.