{"id":124367,"date":"2026-07-24T04:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/timesnewsgroup.com.au\/ballarat\/?p=124367"},"modified":"2026-07-22T17:54:25","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T07:54:25","slug":"athletics-centreon-pace-for-finish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesnewsgroup.com.au\/ballarat\/news\/athletics-centreon-pace-for-finish\/","title":{"rendered":"Athletics Centreon pace for finish"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>THE new Ballarat Regional Athletics Centre (BRAC) now under construction on the former Ballarat Showgrounds site is only months away from completion.<\/p>\n<p>Minister for Sports, Tourism and Major Events Steve Dimopoulos was in Ballarat last Thursday to join Athletics Ballarat members for a progress tour of the Wendouree venue which has an athletics track, field event zones, a pavilion, shaded spectator seating, and equipment shed.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our community of athletics is over 30,000 people in Ballarat,&#8221; said Athletics Ballarat chair Matt Jenkins.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;This venue will see close to 30 to 35,000 students competing every year<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll be able to host state and national events, and see athletes from young kids running for the first time right up to the very best in this country right here in Ballarat<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We are very proud and excited to bring it to life.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_30038\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-30038\" style=\"width: 600px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-30038 \" src=\"https:\/\/static.timesnewsgroup.com.au\/prod\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2026\/07\/IMG_8202_28455.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"365\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-30038\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Athletics Ballarat sprinters Mackenzie Estlick, Grace Crowe and Nyajima Jock with Wendouree MP Juliana Addison (second from left) and Minister for Sports, Tourism and Major Events Steve Dimopoulos (second from right) at the Ballarat Regional Athletics Centre. Photo: Edwina Williams<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re on track to move in in October, hopefully, and we then start the next journey of what is a very strong athletic history in Ballarat.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Young sprinter Nyajima Jock compared the old surface at Llanberris Athletics Reserve \u2013 which the new BRAC facility will replace \u2013 with the track at Wendouree.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The quality of the new track already feels a lot better, so we will get better performances on the track,&#8221; she said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The track at Llanberris has a hard surface. This one is a bit softer and you get a bit of bounce back.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Kane Nicholson is the head contractor of the state Regional Sports Infrastructure Program-funded project, which also includes precinct accessibility improvements.<\/p>\n<p>Wendouree MP Juliana Addison and City of Ballarat mayor Cr Tracey Hargreaves were also part of the tour.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>THE new Ballarat Regional Athletics Centre (BRAC) now under construction on the former Ballarat Showgrounds site is only months away from completion. Minister for Sports, Tourism and Major Events Steve Dimopoulos was in Ballarat last Thursday to join Athletics Ballarat members for a progress tour of the Wendouree venue which has an athletics track, field [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/timesnewsgroup.com.au\/ballarat\/news\/athletics-centreon-pace-for-finish\/\">Read More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":139,"featured_media":124371,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"featured_section_post":"main_featured","home_featured_section_post":"main_featured","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-124367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Athletics Centreon pace for finish - 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