By Len Johnson
Does anyone know where to buy one of those “I forgot your birthday” birthday cards? Not for a person _ this one is for an event. This year marks the 100
th anniversary of the Australian men’s cross-country championships turns 100. No-one seems to have noticed.
The women’s championship turns 50 as well. In keeping with our sport’s shameful history of denying women opportunities to compete equally for far too long, the women’s championship was first contested in 1960. But it has been contested every year since then, and last year Athletics New South Wales made a highlight of the 50th staging of the championship at Nowra.

The men’s championship has had a broken history. It was first staged in 1910 in Hobart, then again in 1912. From 1923 until 1929 the championship was conducted every two years. The second world war saw the suspension of all championships, including the cross-country, then it resumed the two-year cycle from 1946 to 1954 and 1955 to 1973 (presumably it went from even to odd years in 1955 to avoid a clash with the Melbourne 1956 Olympic Games).
From 1973 onwards, the cross-country has been run annually. By my count, then, this weekend’s championships in Brisbane are the 64th, and will be the 38th men’s championship held on an annual basis.
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I hope the cross-country will forgive us for forgetting its birthday. Like many an ageing citizen, there is some conjecture about its real age. The championship is at least 100 years old; indeed, it could even be 102.
Two years before the first official championship, an interstate cross-country team race was held at Victoria Park Racecourse in Sydney. It was a national championship in all but name. The race, over five miles, was won by Ballarat’s Charles Suffren and Victoria won the team component.
If you think the name ‘Suffren’ sounds vaguely familiar, you’re right. An annual race named in his honour is still conducted in Ballarat. Fittingly, it has been won by some of Victoria’s best _ including another Ballarat legend, Steve Moneghetti.
So 1910 in Hobart was the first championship and, in keeping with the practice of the day, it was an Australasian championship. Australia and New Zealand co-operated in far more ventures then than they do now _ the 1908 and 1912 Olympic teams and, until 1928, the track and field championships were also combined affairs.
The Hobart race at Elwick Racecourse, over 10 miles, was won by Andrew Wood of NSW. New South Wales also won the team race. Wood made a thing of winning inaugural championships, the previous year he had won the first Australian marathon title.
The championship has been won by many great runners _ Dave Power, Ron Clarke, Kerry O’Brien, John Farrington, Robert de Castella and Steve Moneghetti all feature on the roster of champions and other notable winners have included Dave Chettle, Gerard Barrett, Garry Henry and Lee Troop.
With the world championships and Olympic Games now featuring on the competition schedule three out of each four years, the best runners are often in Europe when the ‘national’ is held. Neither Craig Mottram nor Benita Willis has ever been national cross-country champion, although Benita is our only world cross-country champion.
‘Deek’ won three in a row from 1978 t0 1980 and then again in 1988, the only time the championships have been held in Darwin. ‘Mona’ won in 1989 and then, amazingly, won again in 2003 just a few days short of his 41st birthday. He beat Patrick Nyangelo of Tanzania who, a couple of weeks earlier, had out-sprinted him in the City to Surf.
With four wins, de Castella heads the list of multiple champions, but special mention should be made of Dave Power.
Power was the first of Australian distance running’s great all-rounders. Starting in the sport as a half-miler, he moved up in distances after suffering a severe spike injury in his lower leg. His first attempt at cross-country was inauspicious _ he pulled out mid-way through a race in Sydney’s Lane Cove. The minimum aim, his coach told him, was to finish!
Power went on to win three national titles, was the marathon and six miles gold medallist at the 1958 Commonwealth Games, the 10,000 metres bronze medallist at the 1960 Rome Olympics and the Commonwealth silver medallist at six miles and marathon in Perth in 1962 _ a record of versatility that sits well alongside de Castella and Moneghetti’s.
On the women’s side, Anna Thompson leads the way with four wins, followed by Kerryn McCann, Kylie risk and Beth Standford, all with three. Should Thompson win this weekend, she would have more wins than any other athlete, male or female.
Thompson has several top-20 finishes in world cross-country to her name and the list of athletes she has defeated in her four titles bear out such credentials. New Zealand’s Kimberley Smith was second in 2002, Emma Rilen in 2004, Donna MacFarlane in 2006 and Lisa Weightman in 2007.
McCann’s record does not need re-telling while Stanford, who was first female finisher in the first two editions of the City to Surf, was a prolific winner of state and national titles back in the days when the women’s distance ranged from one-and-a-half miles to 5k.
Other notable female champions are Brenda Carr (1963 and 1968), Australia’s silver medallist in the Rome 1960 Olympic 800 metres, Krishna Stanton (1986 and 1991) and Jackie Perkins, who won in 1989, the same year in which she finished fifth in the world cross-country.
An earlier edition of the national in Brisbane was 1946, significant because it marked the resumption of national championships after the war (the first post-war track and field titles were not until 1947).
Whether 100 or 102 years old, it is to be hoped this year’s Australian cross-country will make its own significant piece of history.