A record 959 competitors entered the 39th Australian Masters Athletics Track & Field Championships in Melbourne from 26-29 April organised by the Victoria Masters Association, according to Athletics Australia. The Australian M60 Shot Put, 11.89m, set back in 1986 by the Tasmanian Ken McConnell, was broken by Stan Peska (12.57m) and Jack Howard (12.10m).
Meanwhile, in London some 16925km away, the Australian W40 10,000m record holder (33.18.41sec) Sinead Diver, from Melbourne was leading the women’s field for the first 13km in the London marathon. The 42-year old mother of two young boys, who did not take up running until the age of 33, held on to finish 7th in a huge personal best time of 2.24.11sec. The Irish born graduate studied Computing at Limerick University where her sporting interests then were rock climbing and basketball. She went on to represent her adopted country at the IAAF World Championships in Beijing in 2015, finishing 21st with a 2.36.38sec time. She lowered that to 2.31.37 in the Nagoya marathon in 2017. The qualifying time for the IAAF World Championships in Doha this year is 2.31.00sec and this Masters athlete should be able to run her third World Championships.
Bridget Cushen
April 2019
