Round 7 showed how strong our club is in field events. Orla McCarthy broke the club U/14 discus with a throw of 37.77m at Ballarat. At the same venue, “new” 40+ recruit, Graham Hicks, threw a National Qualifier of 48.22m (524 team points). 
To highlight our strength with the discus, we had Dylan Jones throw 40.82m (502pt), Victoria Entwistle-Hardeman 31.60m (438pts) and Hannah Brodie 30.80m (432pts) to name our best performances.
Other throwers to show out were Kevin Healy, hammer 45.81m, 430 pts, Faith Villi shot put, 10.75m 429 pts and Travis Wilson , hammer 25.87m, 410pts and shot 10.34m 415pts. Overall we had 20 athletes have a go at the shot put alone!
Our other great area of strength is the triple jump with 4 top performances. Alywn Jones 15.48m (529pts), Tierra Exum 12.03 (499pts), Angus Wood 13.66m (472pts) and Zara Keca 11.44m (472pts). 
High jumpers also shone with Jordan Mancuso 1.85m (453pts), Jack Walsh 1.80m (437pts), Oscar Cathcart 1.75m (421 pts) and Harry Orr 1.75m (421pts) all battling the wind at Keilor.
On the track on a terrible day we saw some great efforts including Brett Maurer, 200m 24.84s (436pts), Lachie Attard 800m 2:07 (404pts), Jude Cam 110m hurdles at Frankston (447pts), Lauren Connell, leading from the start to win her 800m in 2:20.3 (447pts), Jessie Andrew, 200m 26.12 (447pts), Stella McNamara 200m (with no hurdles to get in the way) 27.29 (411pts) and Mark Donahoo our evergreen walker completing the 3000m walk in 17:24 (447pts).
Eight of our 10 teams had good wins, including all men’s teams. This is a great way to finish of 2018 and a great launching pad to Shield Final, State and National champs.
A BIG THANK YOU to all the athletes and parents who jumped in and helped with our duties. This is something we should all do at some stage during the summer. The next chance is Round 9. Ask what you can do.
Summer Presentation Night is set May 3, 2019 at Windy Hill. 
The two main Shield awards are (1) for the athletes in each team who achieve the single best performance, based on AV’s points system. (2) for the athlete who accumulates the most number of points over the season.
To be eligible for the awards, an athlete needs to compete in at least 4 rounds of Shield.
Entries for Round 8 are now open (Dec 5). We have the opportunity to compete at Lakeside on Friday Dec 14 and again on the following Sat. This is a good opportunity to prepare for running heats and finals on consecutive days.