Welcome to THE MAGPIE, remodeled, Collingwood Harriers Monthly Newsletter.

Lots has happened between newsletters, there has been a Winter Season, Summer Season, State Championships, National Championships, VAL Gifts, Masters Championships, Melbourne Marathon, World Junior Championships and Olympic Games.  Collingwood Harriers members competed in all those listed events and more.

President Scott Lovell, introduces and updates the happenings around the club for the 2025/26 Club Centenary year.  Winter Coordinator, Matthew Crawford gives a wrap on the first four rounds of the XCR season.  And Steve Griffiths pens his Magpie Morsels and Blast from the Past, Moments in the Club's history.

To make certain events, performances and general happenings around the club are not missed, please send newsletter contributions by reply or to the email address at the bottom of the newsletter.

Thank you to those who have registered with club in what will our centenary year who are either returning and big welcome to those who are new to the club and we appreciate your support.

At the recent AGM the new committee was elected and appointed.  President – Scott Lovell, Vice President – Eugene Nemesi, Secretary – Alex Collie, Treasurer – Nick Rosa, Summer Coordinator – Steve Griffiths, Winter Coordinator – Matthew Crawford. 

The club has now appointed a centenary coordinator,  Lucy Collie.

I wish to also welcome Adele Boyland as general member to committee in which I believe Adele is 3rd generation at club and now in committee.

I would love to see more women involved in our discussions and decision processes to ensure we are delivering on what you are looking for in club.

We will shortly announce some special events to help celebrate our centenary year, so please stay tuned for this. 

If you’re friends or training partners have not registered yet, please encourage them to do so as it promises to be an exciting season ahead for all concerned

With our recent election over we are still looking for some support within our committee and if you think you could assist please let us know.

Well done to everyone involved in XCR season thus far and it’s great to see that some of you are achieving PB’s in process. 

For our summer athletes or for those willing to take the plunge the club is holding free event clinics every 3 weeks to help you with mastering each event either in field or track environments. Our next clinic will be horizontal jumps with Grant Sargent on Saturday 21st June from 10am at George Knott Reserve. Please keep a lookout via FB for future updates.

A big thank you to Oliver Blackburn for his time in delivering our 1st clinic on art of throwing a Javelin. 

Well at last we have hot water and new stove as a part of electrification project by the City Of Yarra. thank you for providing these much needed services.

Our license agreement reply to City of Yarra has been submitted (5 year) agreement and we are currently awaiting a response from City of Yarra as to status of this.

Please note that new cleaning services are about to be provided to venue and if you feel that cleanness of the venue is not to standard please let us know.

I pleased to say our venue hires have been very successful thus far with positive commitments from all concerned with bookings from these organisations already in place for next year.

We are looking to improve the transparency of these events moving forward and hopefully will at some point of time provide transparency to all on when the venue is booked.

When its not club training, if you see the large sign board at gate staying the venue is closed for training or competition please respect the hires space as they mostly involve students and child protection standards must be followed.

Also if you see any rubbish lying around please don’t walk past it. Please place in bin so everyone can enjoy our space.

In terms our track future resurfacing, I have raised this topic with City of Yarra as it will be required in approximately 5 years time and some areas of track is starting to show wear signs and we will continue to monitor this. At this stage the City of Yarra has no budget for the estimated $1.3 million required for project but will continue to push them to start considering this major project. 

Best of luck to our high performance athletes who some of which are already overseas competing and others are due to leave shortly. Best of luck from all of us at club for your future efforts!

Looking forward to seeing most of you at either competitions or training and again thank you for being a part of this great community and club!

After a tough 2024 season in which both our men’s and women’s top teams were relegated, we have found ourselves far more competitive in our respective Division 2 grades.

In the Champion Athlete individual award we currently have the following top ten rankings:

Cara Foot - 4^th in 40+

Eugene Nemesi - 4^th in 40+ SC

Magnus Michelsson - 1^st in 55+

Tom Avram - Eq 6^th in 60+

Eric Louw - Eq 6^th in 60+ SC

The season started well in unseasonably warm May weather at Hanging Rock. We had 25 competitors with seven scoring Champion Athlete points (Eugene Nemesi, Cara Foot, Zoe Delany, Danny Reddan, Magnus Michelsson, Tom Avram and Eric Louw) with Magnus coming 1^st in 55+. Our Female Div 2 team came 2^nd, and both Female Div 4 and Male 60+ came 3^rd.

Special mentions to Alice Callagher and Max Parker for great first runs for the club and Ruby Hore for her seamless move from the summer season into the winter!

Round 2 saw us travel to St Anne’s Winery in Myrniong, another great cross country event. Eugene Nemesi, Danny Reddan, Magnus Michelsson and Tom Avram all scored individual points with Magnus 1^st in his age group again (of course).

XCR Round 3 was at Jells Park for our first relay event of the season. The weather looked dicey early during set-up but cleared beautifully for the racing. Div 2 Men (Wolfgang Cotra-Nemesi, Abdi Rhoble, Luke Shaw, Andrew McIntosh, Liam Werrett and Mason Orville Johns) ran a brilliant 2nd place (with a big finish by Mason) being pipped by APS by only 6 seconds! A strong 60+ Men’s team (Paul Viney, Tom Avram and Eric Louw) picked up bronze in their division. Also, a huge effort by Annabel Messer, Grace Wells and Isobel Rhodes in the Female U16 team coming in 5th out of 17 teams.

On the weekend past we convened at Lakeside Stadium in Albert Park for a fast and flat 5km. Cameron Galvin-Stirling continued his great season running a brilliant 18:10 to come 7^th in the U14 and pick up Champion Athlete points. Both Cara Foot and John-Paul Caligiuri won bronze in their respective grades (40+, 45+), with Rochelle Calia (7^th in 45+), Tom Avram (7^th in 60+) and Paul Viney (8^th in 60+) all scoring top ten placings.

With 6 rounds left in the season there are plenty more chances for medals, PBs and fun across cross country, road races and relays. Thank you to everyone who has competed so far.

A grateful appreciation to all who have volunteered and helped keep us running this season including Alice Callagher, Kevin Kondys, Neil Mathews, Tony Dell, Eugene Nemesi, Steve Griffiths and Kevin Wigmore.

The First Tuesday of The Month!

Yes – it’s on again! Collingwood’s World Famous 400s session is on the first Tuesday of the month (July 1^st ) beginning at 6:15pm. 

A great session, not only for general fitness, but to also improve your time/pace judgement. Suitable for everybody!  We have had great numbers in recent months – let’s keep it up!

Better Late Than Never

Club stalwart Chris Waldron was missing from the first run of the winter season at Hanging Rock. He did let us know he wouldn’t make it via a message from Nepal regarding a trek undertaken to “The Base Camp” by he and partner Janette Chapman. Said he’d be back for future races and true to his word, Chris (and Janette), were at St Anne’s and Jells Park and Albert Park. The season would not be the same without them – both past winners of our Club 5 Mile CCC.

Going in the Other Direction

The Club is a few short for the next few weeks due the overseas adventures of some of our winter athletes. Immediately after the Jells Park Relays, Wolfgang Cotra Nemesi departed our shores for a trip to Europe for some international competition. Traveling with a group, Wolfgang will be based in Ireland and hopes to record some good times in a variety of appearances.

There is a big hole in our ladies winter team with the departure of twins Grace and Mikaila Young, also heading to Europe, for approximately seven weeks. Their trip is more of an educational experience, along with some sightseeing, but hopefully they can fit in a couple runs along the way.

Another New Chum

Great to have John Cronin join our ranks for Albert Park. A newcomer to competitive athletics, John is a welcome addition to our 60+ team. Looked in pretty good knick when he picked up his uniform the other night!

Big Improvement

Cameron Galvin-Stirling has been with us for about fourteen months now. He has trained regularly with our junior group, often with boys much older, but has continued to progress. This progress has been most noticeable in the last three months and he was hoping to break twenty minutes for the 5k at Albert Park. Break it……..he smashed the living daylights out of it!

Cam recorded 18:10 in finishing 7^th in the U/14 event – by far his best run with the Club.

(Note: this time is better than the Club Record for the U/14 5k track run.)

Winter Action

Your scribe has been around for a while, but has never seen so many sprinters at the track at this time of the year….ever! Acknowledge - that they are not all members (yet!) but this level of activity can only be good for the Club.

Officially Official

New Vice-President Eugene Nemesi, jumped the fence last season from being an athlete to becoming an athletics official.  Having completed his World Athletics National Athletics Referee qualifications, Eugene officiated at AVSL every Saturday, going on to officiate the Zatopek and Maurie Plant meets where he had the stopwatch on the main event  of  the Gout Gout, Lauchie Kennedy 200m (no pressure).  At the recent end of season officials luncheon, Eugene was presented the Zone A Official of the Year award.  Well Done, next stop Brisbane 2032.

Nutrition and Distance Running Research

Zoe Delaney, one of our dependable athletes over both the winter and summer seasons is doing a research project at La Trobe University.  Zoe is exploring the relationship between sports nutrition knowledge, energy and eating habits in competitive middle-long distnce runners.  Please find the time to assist Zoe with her research by following the link below and completing the survey and quiz.

https://redcap.latrobe.edu.au/redcap/surveys/?s=DA7Y3JF3RX3EEKKC

Performances and Results

Club sprinter Chiara Santiglia worked through the season competing in the VIctorian Athletic League, old fashioned pro racing with handicaps.  Having won the Waverly Gift early in the season, set Chiara up for a start in the prestigious Stawell Gift at seasons end.  Chiara went all the way at Stawell to the final where she finished second in the Women's 120m Gift (the main event).

Mia Gross on the back of Olympic selection in Paris, had a solid domestic season being slected in the 4 x 400m relay squad for the World Relay Championships in China.  A detour on the way to China via Tokyo, had Mia competing in Grand Prix meets there over 100m and 200m.  Mia went onto notch up a win, run a PB and a new Club Record in the 200m (22.73sec).  Back on track to China, Mia joined the other ladies in the relay squad.  Here they braved trying conditions to qualify 2nd for the World Athletics Championships to be held in Tokyo this September.

New member, West Australian import, Luke Shaw, tripped back to the Western Australian Gold Fields to race the Leonora Gift Road Mile.  Having had a successful domestic season racing many of the national track classics Luke decided to take to the road.  Having narrowly missed progession into the final of the Road Mile, Luke was given a start in the 600m Road Gift.  A start was all Luke needed leading the field through the tape to victory.

After victory in the club 100 yard championships.  Budding decathalete, Lenny Robin, ventured north to the Festival of Athletics in warm, sunny Mackay and returned with a swag of medals.  Winning the shot put, making the podium for discus, 100m and 60m.  Lenny has been diligently training the ten disciplines in preparation for the summer ahead.

Event Calendar

June 21

Victorian All Schools Cross Country Championships, Bundoora. (read more)

June 28

XCR Round 5 - Road Relays, Sandown. (read more)

July 1

Griffo's 400 session.

July 6

Gold Coast Marathon - Australian Half Marathon Championships. (read more) 

July 12

XCR Round 6 - State XC Championships, Victoria Park, Ballarat. (read more)

July 27

XCR Round 7 - Lakside 10, Albert Park. (read more)

August 5

Griffo's 400 session.

August 10

XCR Round 8 - 15km Road Race, Lake Windouree, Ballarat. (read more)

August 23

Australian Athletics National XC Championships, Victoria Park, Ballarat. (read more)

August 31

Sydney Marathon - Australian Marathon Championships.  (read more)

September 2

Griffo's 400 session.

September 7

XCR Round 9 - Burnley Half Marathon. (read more)

September 13 - 21

World Athletics Championships, Tokyo. (read more)

September 20

XCR Round 10 - Tan Relays. (read more)

October 26

Burnie 10 - Australian 10km Road Championships. (read more)

Club Uniform and Merchandise

Treat yourself to some new training gear.

In collaboration with Sub4 Apparel, Collingwood Harriers have designed a range of training/warm up tops and apparel.

The long sleeve, short sleeve and singlet are made from Sub4's premium comfortable lightweight DRYLYTE fabric.

The hoodie made from a thick charcoal grey fleece, has black and white prints front and back.

Top it off with a Collingwood Harriers running cap.

All merchandise items are available through a made to order site hosted by Sub4.  This site will be opened periodically through the year to take orders.

www.sub4.com.au/category/collingwood

Keep the head warm through winter with a Collingwood Harriers Beanie, available through the club portal.

Competition tops can also be purchased through the club portal below.

https://www.revolutionise.com.au/collingwood/shop

An interesting and unusual report from the Club Committee Meeting of January 11^th 1932………

Members of the Committee were annoyed to hear that a certain ex member of the C.W.A.A.C. (then women’s club with no official connection to Collingwood Harriers) who had turned professional and was appearing in a boxing and wrestling troupe, was in the habit of wearing the Collingwood Club uniform during her performances.

It was left in the hands of Mr. L. Anderson to ascertain from the Hon. Sec. of the V.A.A.A. whether action could be taken to prevent her wearing the costume

At the following meeting on February 8^th, the Hon.Sec. stated that the ex member of CWAAC who had been wearing the club uniform at boxing matches had been interviewed and had since refrained from wearing the uniform.

Inbetween newsletters stay informed by following our social media channels by clicking the links below.

The newsletter is open to contributions.  Please reply to this or send event details, performances or general happenings to the email below.

Something to chew on...........