Surf dash to Bondi
Volume 11, No. 51, September 07, 2006
By Michael Brooke, Capt Nick Marcovich and Cpl Wayne Heath

Beach sprint: Army’s Cpl Dave Whitehead in the front pack during Sydney’s City to Surf.

ARMY runners led the way to the finish line for the record field of more than 150 ADF runners who contested the 14km City to Surf race from Sydney’s CBD to sunny Bondi beach on August 13.

More than 40 Army athletes from around Australia competed in the gruelling race that featured more than 63,500 runners with Cpl Dave Whitehead of 4RAR and Capt Anne Bortolussi, an Army reservist with 8CSSB taking the honours among the ADF personnel.

In the lead-up, the men’s race looked to be between the ADF 10km champion Cpl Dave Whitehead and ADF Marathon Champion, RAAF’s Flt-Lt Richard Gardiner. In the absence of several noted runners, the women’s event was more open.

Cpl Whitehead of 4RAR was 14th overall in 45min, 4min 11sec behind the winner Tanzania’s Dickson Marwa and 3sec outside the ADF record, a stunning result that underlined his class.
Capt Anne Bortolussi finished in 65min 7sec, well ahead of the other ADF women and not far behind the overall winner who recorded 47min 15sec.

With the compression of runners at the start, a clean getaway was critical and from the moment race record holder Steve Moneghetti fired the starter’s gun, Cpl Whitehead was away with the main leaders. Behind him was a chase pack that included physiotherapist Lt Ross Kinsella from Townsville and the consistent Defence civilian Luke Gratton.

Cpl Whitehead was in a class of his own on the climb up Heartbreak Hill, about 6km into the race between Rose Bay and Vaucluse, as a close battle formed behind between Flt-Lt Gardiner and Gratton for second place before Flt-Lt Gardiner edged out Gratton by metres.

Evergreen City to Surf specialist Rob Combe was also keeping the pressure on his younger opponents.

After recent impressive results at the ADF Marathon, WO2 Richard Quirk in the veterans (over 35) and Maj Greg Barrowcliff in the masters (over 45) were demonstrating that age need not weary as they powered up the hill.

It took an incredible age-defying performance from Andrew Baron to oust WO2 Quirk for the veterans’ title in 49min, all the more impressive because he was unable to guarantee a clear start as a late entrant.
Maj Barrowcliff was equally impressive to win the masters in 53min.