This long weekend of the 30th May to the 1st of June marks the richest bike race in Australia, The Leonora Golden Gift. The Leonora Golden Gift has 1 mile open, 1 mile elite, and 120 metre sprint events as part of the Golden Gift Carnival in Leonora, Western Australia.
In the small outback town of Leonora, elite athletes will be racing with $50,000 up for grabs with a bitumen street as the track. Combine this with dirt track horse racing, fireworks, market stalls, bands, and street entertainment all weekend for the kids and you have yourself the outback experience that is Leonora’s Golden Gift Carnival!
On Their Marks
Another big foot race day was held in Coolgardie in 1893.
Sports meeting Coolgardie 1893 (as recounted in Western Mail March 6, 1941, by ‘Hammer and Tap’ Leonora)
Easter 1893 saw the first sports in Coolgardie and there was a great turnout. The main item on the program was the Sheffield Handicap worth twenty pounds. There was a good entry and some of the nominations were put in for fun, for the men nominating were more likely to run an old buffers race than a ‘speed classic’.
Coolgardie 1893
There was only one man in the lot that had running togs. He was Arthur Williams and he looked like a runner. The handicapper must have thought so too, as he was put well back. Most of the starters had only socks on their feet and a few were barefooted. Men were hard in those days and so had feet as hard as donkeys. I know one man who when he was making Johnny cakes on the coals use to turn them over with his toes.
A couple of runners had “Prince Albert’s” better known as toe rags. But they soon came to grief. Doctor Max Schneider’s running clobber consisted of a pair of tight underpants with one button and a short singlet. When the gun went off they all got a good start, but Doc got the lead. The crowd started to yell out: “Don’t stop Max! Never mind the women!” and he did as he was told. He went straight through the tape and never stopped running until he got to the tree where he had left his clothes. Two women were standing at the tape. Mrs Smith and Mrs Jacalettie. I didn’t notice if they blushed, but their presence there at the finishing post was the reason why the Doc did not stop for congratulations.
The last event on the program was a tug-of-war. Bensted and Dan Colreavy each got a team together. Bob Penny was the anchor man in Colreavy’s team and in Bensted’s team were three burly Afghans. When the word was given to go we got the pull on them and kept them going. Jim Smithers was one of our supporters. He had a bet on the Afghans, and when we got them going Jim threw his hat in the air and shouted “Pull the b———‘s out of Coolgardie!” Everard Browne came to quiet Jim but it made it worse. So ended a perfect day!
Moya Sharp
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