Box Hill entered two men’s teams and one women’s team in the Coliban Relay from Harcourt to Bendigo on Saturday 1 June 2002. Dale Bickham led off strongly for the Division 1 team to have them in third place by the end of the first leg. Unfortunately, Graeme Olden struggled on the climb over Mt Alexander and dropped two places, however John Meagher ran a solid third leg to pass Ballarat YCW and bring the team up into fourth place. Kynan Dawes managed arrived at what he thought was the start of his leg about half an hour before he was due to run only to discover he was actually at the end of the leg so he did a very quick warm-up to run back to the start of the leg, arriving just in time to turn around and run back to the finish again. He managed to hold us in fourth position, and although Sam Hassett, Paul Boxshall and Andrew White all ran solidly, the team was unable to make up much ground on APS and completed the race in fourth place.
The Division 3 team started well with Chris O’Connor handing over to Tony Bird in third place. Adam Pepper, Patrick Kelly and Cam McIver all ran strongly but were unable to catch the teams in front.
The Division 1 Women’s team of Nikki Chapple, Jocelyn Keage, Emily Smith, Prue Healy and Eliza Eddy all ran great legs to take the team into third place and win a bronze medal.
Many thanks to Julie Milner and Matt Slater for driving to Bendigo to help with ferrying athletes along the course and provide encouragement to the runners along the way.