Unity Relay SPDF ‘A’ team win in new record time |04 December 2017

The Seychelles People’s Defence Forces (SPDF) ‘A’ team won this year’s Unity Relay to retain their title and they did it in style with a new record time on Saturday.

The team reached the finish line at Stad Popiler in 4 hours 05 minutes 25 seconds (4h05:25) to improve the previous record of 4h09:29 set by the East Coast Athletics Club in 2012.

The SPDF ‘A’ team comprised Iven Moise, Shane Boniface, Tony Victor, Melina Crispin, Terrence Tamboo, Elvin Bonne, Davis Bonne, Roch Bamboche, Guillo Charlot and young civilian Ishveen Paulin. In fact, Paulin celebrated her 15th birthday on Saturday and what a nice present it was for her to be part of the fastest team to win the gruelling race.

Speaking to Sports NATION, Eddie Lozaique, sports officer within the SPDF, said compared to past years when SPDF fielded two teams and went for the one-two finish, this time they went all out to destroy the record this year.

“We were all out to destroy the record this time and we’ve done it by 4 minutes. We had the SPDF ‘B’ team do the spade work and the strategy worked well. We beat the record by 4 minutes,” former 400m runner Lozaique told Sports NATION.

In second position was the Port Glaud Shooting Stars with a time of 4h28:12 and Indian Ocean Tuna (IOT) completed the medals podium with a third place finish in 4h29:44.

Eight other teams completed the relay and they are NMCC Seychelles (fourth with 4h32:22), Anse Royale Athletics Club (fifth with 4h40:58), Constance Ephelia (sixth with 5h03:22), SPDF ‘B’ (seventh with 5h08:53), Judiciary (eighth with 5h14:38), International School Seychelles (ninth with 5h36:06), Aquafins Swimming Club (10th with 6h49:51) and Albatros/Stay Young (11th with 7h01:59).

The Unity Relay sees teams race in a free relay over Mahé, where at the start everyone had to run from Stad Linite up to the Unity Monument in Victoria, before they could start racing one by one, changing the running member at any point.

The finish line for the relay on Saturday was at Stad Popiler.

G. G.