President's Report: October 2023

Simone Hayes • October 30, 2023

Wow, it’s been a big few months with some even bigger ones to come, so I thought it would be nice to touch base with you on a monthly basis via Ultramag to fill you in on what we have been doing behind the scenes, how our calendar and events are shaping up, what new benefits we have to offer you and more!

The Committee wishes to keep everything we do completely transparent and keep you informed. We hope this regular report offers that to you all and gets you excited about what’s happening in Australia’s running scene.

Our Australian representatives are almost ready to fly our flag!

50km World Championships

Next week our Aussie representatives for the 50km world champs leave for Hyderabad, India to race on 5 November. We have a small but strong team of 3 men made up of Wayne Spies (Captain), Ben MacCronan and Tom Brimelow. All three are fit and ready to go and we wish them all the best for a safe trip and a successful race!

24 Hour World Championships

In less than 6 weeks our 24 hour reps head to Taipei to compete in the first 24 hour world champs since 2019 after a break during the pandemic. The large team of 6 men and 6 women team take to the track on 1 December and I believe we have the strongest team we have ever put together. We will touch base next month on the team closer to the event.

The 2024 Events Calendar is now live!

We are pleased to announce that the AURA 2024 Calendar is now open and live on the website. You can now start planning your year to make it your best year yet! Take note of our National Championship dates as well. We have some new events hosting these this year as well as many new events appearing for us all to take part in. 2024 is shaping up to be an awesome year of running!

Not all of us care about records and trophies, most of us run for the love of it and we are trying to expand this calendar for everyone in the running community to take part in and enjoy. We’ll always have our elites but they realistically make up a small part of who we are – runners that love to get out there in the community, experience new events, new trails and meet new people!

Exciting news – we have a new website coming!

We have been busy working behind the scenes all year developing a new website that we believe will be more user friendly, offer more to members and provide you with heaps of cool stuff to fuel your running habit with. We will be offering more content for members such as our Coaches Corner with lots of solid evidence based articles to help you improve and succeed written by AURA accredited coaches. We will also have links to these coaches if anyone is looking for guidance or for a coach. Also new will be our Gear Review section where we will be testing new products and giving you the rundown. We are working on delivering more and more Member Benefits Discounts so you can all go nuts shopping as runners love to do! We also plan to have some fun member-only competitions and giveaways throughout the year.

Information and entertainment wise there will be a lot of free content for runners such as podcast links (featuring our members and also lots of great interviews with experts regarding all things running) so you can ‘click and go’ on your next run direct from the website. Ultramag will now have full free access to all, as we want to share the love. All AURA history and records remains the same but will be easier to find. The backend has also improved but that’s all boring stuff you don’t need to know about.

And did I mention it looks great? So, watch this space, we plan to launch before the end of the year.

AURA State Representatives

Our State Reps have been busy spreading the word in their respective states and doing a fabulous job sharing with you what is going on, what events are coming up and what has come and gone. They are there to engage with the community and help in any way they can so please, reach out if you have any questions or you can post on your state page if you have something running worthy to share.

Thank you to our volunteers

As I said at the start, it’s been a big year. This is my fourth year on the committee and my first year as President and it’s been a big step up and a challenge at times, but I’m learning as I go and could not do it without the support of the amazing committee by my side, with Matthew Eckford, Stephen Redfern and Annabel Hepworth. These guys have been my rocks. We are a committee of four and we work well as a team and I couldn’t do it without them.

I also need to extend an enormous thanks to Alexis Oosterhoff whom without, we would all be lost! His input and hours of help he offers to AURA from results compilation to solving all of our IT issues (there are many as we are all a bit challenged in this area!) cannot be measured and we thank him from the bottom of our hearts. I also wish to thank our records officer Tia Jones who has been working tirelessly going through records to either ratify them or make sure all records are going to the correct people – this really is no small task and she does it for the athletes, so thank you.

So that’s a wrap – there is so much more I could write here but going to save something for next month!

Simone Hayes
AURA President

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AUTRA News Report 19-02-2025

By Kate Dzienis • February 19, 2025

The latest in race results, covering Cradle Mountain Run, City Run, Oscars 100 Hut 2 Hut and Yaberoo Trail Ultra.

Final 2024 Points Competition Results

By Alexis Oosterhoff • January 30, 2025

Results for the 2024 AUTRA Points Competition have been finalised, and are available on our Points Competition page. Full details of the top 10 (as shared on Facebook during January) are detailed below, and results for all participating AUTRA members can be found in the documents at the above link. It was a real battle throughout the year between our top two finishers, Phil Gore & Kevin "BK" Matthews, with both giving it their it their all at events, and through contributions to the community - volunteering at multiple events, and submitting articles to our monthly newsletter, Ultramag. They finished within 2km of total distance for the year (Phil on 1203.087km, and Kevin on 1205.510km), and it was only Phil's final volunteering effort on 6 Inch Trail Marathon in December that gave him the that very narrow victory. As you'd be aware from previous communications, this marks the end of the Points Competition. With trail running (of all distances) now incorporated into AU T RA's constitution, and after careful consideration of the costs of the competition payouts in it's current form, the committee felt it was time for it's retirement. This marks my seventh and final year of delivering the points competition to membership (2018-2024), after taking on the role from Cheryl Symons. It has brought me great joy in doing so, and I feel like I've had an opportunity to get to know so many of our members through seeing their race (and volunteering) performances over the years! I'm continuing in my role as the AUS/NZL statistician for DUV (from whom we shared the data for the points comp), and you can expect to continue to find your ultra-race result on their site. 1st Place - Phil Gore (WA) - 86 points Phil's achievements this year have included a massive 265.653km (and 2nd place) at the IAU 24h Asia & Oceania Championships, wins at the Red Dirt Backyard Ultra (33 laps), the Australian leg of Big Dog's Backyard World Team Championship (96 laps), and the Soochow/Taipei 24h Ultramarathon (270.826km). He also knocked out an easy (!) 72km at the Light Horse Ultra 24h in between supporting his amazing wife Gemma. Those two 24h wins netted Phil new Oceania 24h Open Male records, IAU Level 1 qualifiers, and pushed him to the top of Australia's 24h trophy board (with only the great Yiannis Kouros having run further). Phil topped-up his points by contributing one article to Ultramag, worked as an Event Director at Herdy's Frontyard Ultra, and volunteered at a further five events through the year. He finished on 86 points. 2nd Place - Kevin Matthews (WA) - 84 points Finishing in 2nd place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is WA's Kevin Matthews. He monstered his way through the year with finishes at Australia Day Ultra 100km, Delirious WEST 200mi, 24 laps at Herdy's Frontyard Ultra, 190km at Light Horse Ultra 24h, 23 laps at Birdy's Backyard Ultra, and also completed Feral Pig 100 miler, Sandman 50km and Six Inch 47km. And to top things off, he contributed five articles to Ultramag, and volunteered at five events. BK ran 1205km in Ultramarathon races this year, all of them AUTRA-listed, and surpassed 100 marathon finishes (including 51 Ultramarathons!) Kevin finished the year on 84 points, a massive 34 points ahead of our 3rd place finisher Sue Robertson. 3rd Place - Sue Robertson (WA) - 50 points Finishing in 3rd place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is WA's Sue Robertson. Sue completed the Ultra Series 100 miler trilogy of Delirious WEST, Irrational SOUTH and Unreasonable EAST, and rounded out her year with the Sandman 50km and Six Inch 47km races. She received 30 points from the racing at AUTRA-listed events, and was awarded a further 20 points by volunteering across eight events and contributing two articles to Ultramag, for a total of 50 points for the year. Thank you Sue! 4th Place - Margie Hadley (WA) - 47 points Finishing in 4th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is WA's Margie Hadley . She was the top-female finisher at both the No Time to Die Frontyard Ultra & Wild Dog Backyard Ultra, 2nd at Birdy's Backyard Ultra, ran 182km at the Australian 24h Track Invitational and placed 3rd at Coast to Kosci. Margie received 47 points in the competition 5th Place - Melissa Robertson (NSW) - 44 points Finishing in 5th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is NSW's Melissa Robertson. Melissa took out 1st place at Irrational SOUTH 200 miler, 2nd place at Lakes Trail Festival 100km, 1st place at Hume & Hovell 100 miler, 3rd place at Rumble in the Jungle and 6th place at Ultra-Trail Kosciuszko 100 miler! She also volunteered at the GNW 50km event, receiving 44 points in the competition! 6th Place - Aaron Young (WA) - 42 points Finishing in 6th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is WA's Aaron Young . Aaron finished in 1st place at each of the Ultra Series "Triple Crown" of 200 milers (Delirious WEST, Irrational SOUTH and Unreasonable EAST), 55 laps at Big Dog's Backyard World Team Championship, and rounded his year out with Feral Pig 100 miler. Aaron receives 42 points, just nudging ahead of Maree Connor (who also finished on 42 points) on a count-back 7th Place - Maree Connor (NSW) - 42 points Finishing in 7th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is NSW's Maree Connor. Maree had an outstanding year, achieving 2nd place with 221km (and an IAU Level 1 qualifier) at the IAU 24th Asian and Oceania Championships, 1st place at the Lakes Trail Festival 100km, 1st place with 67km at the Southern Sydney 6h race, and 1st place with 116km at the Narrabeen Allnighter 12h. Maree also competed at Spartathlon race this year (for which she contributed an article to the September Ultramag on her experience), receiving 42 points in the competition. 8th Place - Darren Linney (SA) - 41 points Finishing in 8th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is SA's Darren Linney . Darren completed 34 laps at No Time to Die BYU, 199km at the Adelaide 24h race, and 814km at the Australian 6 Day race, for a total of 1241km raced and 41 points . 9th Place - Tristan Cameron (WA) - 40 points Finishing in 9th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is WA's Tristan Cameron. Tristan completed the Ultra Series Triple Crown of 200 mile races (Delirious WEST, Irrational SOUTH and Unreasonable EAST), along with Feral Pig 100 miler, for a total of 1154km raced and 40 points. 10th Place - Jen Millum (WA) - 39 points Finishing in 10th place in the AUTRA 2024 Points Competition is WA's Jen Millum . Jen finished 1st at all three of the Ultra Series Trilogy of 100 milers (Delirious WEST, Irrational SOUTH and Unreasonable EAST), and was 2nd female with 35 laps at the Wild Dog Backyard Ultra. With a volunteer stint at the Yaberoo Trail Ultra, Jen finished the year with 39 points in the competition. To view the complete list of members who secured points in 2024 click here and then follow through to Points Summary under the 2024 tab. All winners have already been contacted, with cash prizes distributed for 1st - 7th places, and AUTRA Store vouchers sent for 8th, 9th & 10th.