The Stawell Gift handicapper tasked with determining the marks for the men’s 120 metres, the event which featured Gout Gout and Lachlan Kennedy over the Easter long weekend, is copping ferocious criticism after the major drawcards of this year’s edition did not reach the final.
But in a sensational twist a day after the two hottest male sprinters in Australian athletics were bundled out in the semi-finals, Kennedy’s coach has described such criticism as “absolute crap”.
Handicapper Colin Lane has also been defended staunchly by the president of the Victorian Athletic League (VAL), which runs the iconic event held on the grass of Central Park.
Andrew Iselin and VAL president Matt McDonough said the handicapper had operated according to the rules.
McDonough also said it was “unlucky” that Gout was drawn in the same semi-final heat as John Evans, who had short odds and was the eventual Stawell Gift winner, and explained officials were not able to adjust the draw because it was done according to an algorithm.
However, McDonough also admitted the semi-final exits of Gout and Kennedy made for an anti-climax, and said he understood why thousands of people felt let down.
The VAL boss also said both the handicapping system and the drawing process for the semi-finals would be reviewed ahead of next year’s edition.
Gout Gout (right) in action in his semi-final heat.
Gout Gout (right) in action in his semi-final heat. Getty
Kennedy had the heaviest handicap of the 143-strong field — a mark of 0.25 metres — and Gout’s mark of 1.00 metre was the second-toughest.
Evans, a 28-year-old Adelaide school teacher, was given a 9.75-metre handicap.
The guy who eliminated 21-year-old Kennedy in the semi-finals was 17-year-old Dash Muir, who had a mark of 7.75 metres.
The maximum head start anyone had was 10 metres, with 17 of the 143 entrants running off that mark.
At the core of the controversy is the collision of two worlds: the world of runners such as Evans who only compete in handicapped races, and the world of athletes such as Gout and Kennedy, who are elite sprinters and only dip their toes in the handicap scene.
It has been suggested in the mainstream media that in giving Evans such a big head start, the handicapper “had a howler” and got it “terribly wrong”, while social media has been inundated with people hitting out over the job the handicapper did.
“I reckon that’s absolute crap. They do what they can with the data available to them,” Iselin, Kennedy’s coach, told Wide World of Sports.
“They would have had to basically rig it for Lachie and Gout to make the final, and there would have been backlash for that as well.
Gout Gout (left) and Lachlan Kennedy embrace at the Stawell Gift.
Gout Gout (left) and Lachlan Kennedy embrace at the Stawell Gift. Getty
“I respect what the Stawell Gift and VAL officials do, and they do it their way.
“The stuff about the guy who does the marks getting it wrong is absolutely wrong. That’s an unnecessary comment that causes more and more people to turn away from gift racing because they think it’s all rigged.
“The reality is he [Evans] ran well on the day. That’s what I think. These people peak for a Stawell race. For example, you’re not going to be lightening your training load for any other [handicapped] races. The more accomplished runners [such as Gout and Kennedy] are peaking for nationals the week before.”
The handicapper works with a target time of 12.25 seconds, meaning he must set out the marks with the aim of having every runner finish as close to 12.25 seconds as possible.
Evans breached that mark in both his semi-final heat and the final, clocking 12.10 and 11.94 to secure the $40,000 pay cheque on offer.
But McDonough said Evans’ mark of 9.75m was spot on.
“Our rules have been in place now for at least 10 years. There’s nothing being done outside of the rules that have been published and in place for a number of years, so the mark he was given was correct,” McDonough told Wide World of Sports.
John Evans celebrates winning the 2025 Stawell Gift.
John Evans celebrates conquering the Stawell Gift. Getty
The VAL boss explained the league’s bonus system.
“We wanted to increase and encourage participation so people would run regularly throughout the season, and then for us to give them a fair handicap at Stawell. So we put it in the system that if you run early in the season and you show some form and go and win a race, we’ll give you a guaranteed lift for Stawell. So you keep your handicap that you won off, plus you get a bonus,” McDonough said.
“For most of the races up until Christmas, you get a 0.75m lift. After Christmas, that becomes half a metre. Then in February and March that lift is only 0.25m.
“You need to meet criteria. We need to have seen you run at least three times before.
“It encourages some really fierce competition at our earlier meetings, which we hadn’t had in the past. The athletes are vying for these little bonuses. They think they’ve got enough mark, and they take that mark and add a little bonus.
“We have a few privisos with those bonuses, though. So if they run and their bonus takes them below the ceiling point time [12.25 seconds], then they won’t get the full bonus. John took his bonus and went away and just trained, and obviously he trained better and better and better, and he got himself in a position where he knew he could run faster than the target time [12.25 seconds].”
Evans won the 120m at the Terang Gift in December. In doing so, he made himself eligible for bonuses, which he accumulated in Terang and by participating throughout the remainder of the VAL season.
McDonough said the VAL was “quite happy” with the system but admitted there may be “room for improvement”.
“We may have to look at, ‘OK, we’ve got a target time of 12.25 [seconds]. We know that John Evans, Dash Muir, Jasper Thomas are probably going to be in shape to run faster than 12.25. So we need to be able to factor in if a Gout or a Kennedy turns up, how do we handicap them, within our rules, to be competitive?” McDonough said.
“We didn’t know at the start of the season we were going to have Gout or Kennedy in the Stawell field. So our 12.25 target time and bonus system probably didn’t factor in that Gout and Kennedy were going to be at Stawell.
“We want to make it fair for all. We want to make it fair for the regular pro runner who turns up, who’s been running with us and gets into career-best, lifetime shape, and we want them to be competitive. If Gout and Kennedy turn up for one race we also want to make them competitive. We just have to work out how to factor that in.
“The handicapper had no discretion to give Gout or Kennedy more, but in reality he probably knew for them to win the race that they needed more up their sleeve. He probably knew Kennedy needed 1.00m. Now, that doesn’t sound good. But I think that’s where we’ve got to look at our rules.
“If we’ve got the fastest man in Australia who comes to Stawell and runs well at Stawell, he should be a good chance to win. That’s where we’ve got a little bit of tweaking to do around the edges.”
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Prior to the weekend, Stawell Gift expert Nick Fiedler had predicted in an interview with Wide World of Sports that Gout would win the final and Evans would finish third.
Fiedler, who’s coached four Stawell Gift winners and has attended every edition since 1992, also predicted the final to be as close a final as he’d ever witnessed.
So when Gout and Evans were drawn in the same semi-final heat, there was suddenly a distinct possibility that the 17-year-old sensation would not qualify for the final, given only the winners of the six semi-final heats would advance to the showpiece race.
“There was talk about how Gout drew John Evans, and it was because Evans ran the fastest time [of the heats] and Gout was 12th,” McDonough explained.
If Gout’s heat time had ranked 11th or 13th, as opposed to 12th, he wouldn’t have been drawn in Evans’ semi-final heat.
“We got unlucky,” McDonough said, “but we were in no position to change it; that would be altering our rules.”
Flagging a potential change ahead of next year’s edition, the VAL boss said discretion may be introduced to the drawing of the semi-final heats.
“I think we have a chat with the event promoter and maybe we seed the fastest six, so they go in separate semis, and then we have discretion after that,” McDonough said.
“We knew the crowd was doubled and all eyes were on Gout and Kennedy.
“At the same time, we’ve got to stick to our rules and give everyone a chance.
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