Athletics NSW Treloar Shield Final; Sydney Olympic Park Athletics Centre; 17 December 2022
Andres represented UTS Norths in the Open Long Jump; U18 100m sprint; U18 2x100m relay; U18 mixed 4x200m relay.
Andres was selected to represent UTS Norths at the final event of the Treloar Shield points competition – a great achievement given he would be competing in both the Open and U18 categories as a 14 year old!
Results: 10th in Open Long Jump; 9th in U18 100m; 2nd in U18 2x100m relay; 1st in U18 mixed 4x200m relay
Open Long Jump
Andres was surprised and a bit daunted to be selected in the Open mens long jump team, with none other than Commonwealth Games Decathlete Alec Diamond as a team mate! No pressure!!
He jumped cautiously on his first jump for a 5.16m, well short of his PB. His second jump, he went for it, measuring 6.21m which would have been a huge PB – but unfortunately his toe was just past the end of the board by around 1cm and so it was called a foul. That result would have seen him finish 6th in the Open division! His third jump was also measured at well over 6m, but again, he fouled. Still – the aim was to bag as many points for the club as he could – and his 9 points for 10th place certainly contributed towards the club securing the Treloar Shield title in the Open division, so mission accomplished.
U18 Men 100m sprint
Andres ran a bit off his best, but the huge 3.6m/s head wind and gusty conditions made it difficult for everyone, and results were generally much slower than their best. One race we saw wind readings of a 6.6m/s head wind – which would have been really hard work running into!
Still, his 9th place overall was worth 10 points for the club – which turned out to be crucial in the final outcome for the Shield trophy.
| Section 2 | 11.90 (-3.6) | 9th place overall |
U18 Men 2x100m relay
Andres has never run a 2x100m relay before – and it took a moment to get his head around how it works. It’s basically the same as a 4x100m relay, except the first runner starts at the 200m mark, runs around the bend and then passes to the second runner as normal – who then runs to the finish line. It’s a very exciting format, because there is no recovering from a messy change – you get exactly one chance to get it right. He ran with a 15yo athlete and together they secured 2nd place in the U18 category – a great result!
| Straight final | 23.10 | 2nd place |
U18 Mixed 4x200m relay
Andres has only ever run a 4x200m relay once before – when he was 8 years old at the 2016 Little Athletics State Relay Championships. This race was a slightly different format, where only the first two-and-a-half legs are run in lanes before merging on the back straight like they do in an 800m race. His team mates were an U17 girl, an U15 girl and an U15 boy – so to take the win with quite a young team was an excellent result. The girls are both excellent 200m runners and set up the boys to finish the last two legs with a commanding win.
More importantly – this was the final U18 race of the day and the points score to this point saw UTS Norths with only a narrow lead over Wests Track and Field – to the point where Wests winning the race would see them take the U18 title. By winning the race, the team secured the U18 Treloar Shield for UTS Norths – a fantastic outcome.
| Straight final | 1:37.09 | 1st place |
