Cedric Dubler's decathlon win has been recognised as the best performance of the 2022 Australian Track & Field Championships, while Australia has a new Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour champion duo to headline the weekend in Olympic sport.
Athletics
A Personal Best score of 8,393 for Cedric in winning the decathlon earned him the Betty Cuthbert Award for Best Single Performance at the meet.
At the conclusion of the championships Australia has 13 Olympians, including Cedric, automatically selected to the Australian Team for the 2022 World Athletics Championships at Orego, USA in July.
The track athletes include Peter Bol (800m), Catriona Bisset (800m), Liz Clay (110m hurdles), Oliver Hoare (1500m), Jessica Hull (5000m), Jack Rayner (10,000m), Jemima Montag (20km race walk) and Declan Tingay (20km race walk).
Liz secured back-to-back 100m hurdles national titles with a 12.72 second run, blitzing all challengers.
The field athletes feature Nicola McDermott (High Jump), Matt Denny (Discus), Nina Kennedy and Kurtis Marschall (Pole Vault).
Nicola, a Tokyo 2020 silver medallist, soared over 1.94m to push herself clear of the competition in her first Australian event since the Olympics.
On the final night Olympic champion Steve Hooker, dual Olympian Joanna Nixon, Australia’s first female track and field athlete to make an Olympic final Doris Carter and Olympic bronze medallist Hector Hogan were inducted to the Athletics Australia Hall of Fame.
Beach Volleyball
Australian pair Izac Carracher and Mark Nicolaidis have gone undefeated to be crowned inaugural men’s champions of the Volleyball World Beach Pro Tour Futures event.
They played Canada’s Jake MacNeil and Alexander Russell in the gold medal match, winning in straight sets (21-11, 21-16), who they also beat in the pool stages.
To get to the gold medal match Mark and Izac had to beat fellow Aussies Max Guehrer and Thomas Hodges in the semi-finals (21-14, 24-26, 15-8).
Mark got the duo off to a great start in the gold medal match and was excited about how it all came together for them.
“It’s really rewarding to see some of that progress that we’ve been able to make over the last few months pay off,” Mark said.
Izac couldn’t have been happier with a gold medal in his debut World Tour event.
“To be able to get the gold, in front of a home crowd here at Coolangatta is pretty awesome,” Izac said.
Max and Thomas won the bronze medal game in straight sets against Poland (21-13, 21-18).
Top seeded Australian pair Nicole Laird and Phoebe Bell played off against USA’s Taryn Kloth and Kristen Nuss for the women’s gold medal.
Both teams were eager to get the win, translating to a three-set thriller on Coolangatta Beach (19-21, 21-9, 15-7).
Rowing
Three of Australia’s four gold medal winning men's four members from the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games have guided NSW to victory in the King's Cup Interstate men's eight final, held Sunday at Nagambie Lakes Regatta Centre as part of the 2022 Australian Rowing Championships.
The curtain closer to the week-long regatta saw Olympic Champions Alex Purnell, Spencer Turrin, Jack Hargreaves and their crewmates reclaim the King's Cup from Victoria with a decisive victory.
In 2021 Victoria stormed home in the final moments of the race to defeat NSW by 0.16 seconds. This year NSW was leaving nothing to chance, taking an early lead which they steadily enhanced throughout the length of the 2000 metre course. They finished with a length over silver medallists Victoria, with Western Australia claiming bronze.
“It’s just an amazing feeling,” stroke Alex said post-race.
“We had a bit more preparation this year, and we really wanted to get that trophy back. We had some really good training sessions leading into the race today, and the warm up was spot on so we just executed what we needed to do in the race.
“I think that last year’s disappointment adds to this year’s jubilation.”
The Queen's Cup saw another all-the-way win to early leaders Victoria, whose crew boasted Olympic medallists Lucy Stephan and Ria Thompson as well as Olympians Sarah Hawe and Katrina Werry.
Katrina, the stroke of the eight explained “I just needed to do my role the best I could, so that the girls behind me had something to follow.
“To be able to do this in our home state, in Victoria, it gives us a sense of home pride. The girls are just so ecstatic," Katrina said.
NSW finished with the silver medal while Western Australia finished with the bronze.
The overall point score to win the Rowing Australia Cup also went to NSW.
