Volume 49, No. 15 , August 24 , 2006

SURF’S UP: Navy runners in the 12 km Sydney City to Surf acquitted themselves well in the 63,500-strong field. Photo: Michael Brooke

By Michael Brooke

The fleet-footed Navy runners who competed in the 14km City to Surf race from Sydney’s CBD to sunny Bondi beach on August 13 ran with great gusto and proved themselves to be anything but fish out of water.

More than a dozen Navy athletes from around Australia competed in the gruelling race that featured more than 63,500 runners.
LEUT Jeff Rayner, 46, finished the race in a time of 55 minutes, which was only 10 minutes slower than the Army’s best effort and 15 minutes behind the actual race winner.
“It’s not a bad effort for an old bloke,” said LEUT Rayner, who was an aviation engineer in the RAN for 22-years but is now a Reservist at HMAS Albatross.
A feature of the race was the three Navy captains who crossed the finish line within seconds of each other. CAPT Peter Scott, Director Development Wargaming & Evaluation at RAAF Williamtown, CAPT Andrew Whittaker, the DMPP at Campbell Park, and CAPT Frank Kresse, J5 Plans Victoria Barracks-Melb, finished the 14 km race in under 59 minutes.
The trio will remember this race for their super-human effort, because they literally cantered across the finish line ahead of Superman, Spiderman and other about a dozen other people dressed as super heroes.

From Navy News’ perspective, it didn’t matter if you sprinted, jogged, or walked to Bondi, it was a day when everyone who finished deserved to be a hero for a day.
While the official winner was a Tanzanian, the 2006 City To Surf was all about super heroes.
Superman took the early race honours, out sprinting the professionals over the first kilometre of the 14km fun-run from Sydney’s CBD to Bondi. But when the man of steel failed to emerge from an overpass near Kings Cross, Dickson Marwa took over.

The 24-year-old Tanzanian broke away from three Australians on the notorious heartbreak hill to take victory in 40 minutes 49 seconds, missing the race record by 46 seconds.