The Maurie Plant Meet – Melbourne is an annual outdoor

track and field Track and field (or athletics in British English) is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name used in North America is derived from where the sport takes place, a ru ...

meeting which takes place in February at the

Lakeside Stadium Lakeside Stadium is an Australian sports arena in the South Melbourne suburb of Albert Park. Comprising an athletics track and soccer stadium, it currently serves as the home ground and administrative base for association football club South M ...

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

, Australia since 2023. Last held under the old name, Melbourne Track Classic, in early March 2016, prior to 2012 the meeting was held at the Olympic Park Stadium. The competition was inaugurated in the late 1980s at the Olympic Stadium and gained a place on the IAAF Grand Prix circuit in its formative years. It remained on the major international outdoor track and field circuit, featuring as the opening race of the year on the IAAF World Athletics Tour from 2005 to 2009. It was the first race of the

IAAF World Challenge The IAAF World Challenge was an annual, global circuit of one-day track and field competitions organized by the International Association of Athletics Federations World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation ...

series from 2010 through 2016. The event was also one of the foremost meets of the Australian Athletics Tour, along with the Sydney Track Classic. In 2023, the meet was upgraded and reimagined as the Maurie Plant Meet – Melbourne, held in memory of the athletics luminary as

World Athletics Continental Tour The World Athletics Continental Tour is an annual series of independent track and field athletic competitions, recognised by World Athletics (formerly known as the IAAF). The Tour forms the second tier of international one-day meetings after the ...

Gold Level meet and part of the Chemist Warehouse Summer Series. Plant was known as one of the driving forces in the development and promotion of athletics in Australia. He was a meet promoter and athlete agent as well as strong supporter of the athletes. Plant was not without controversy, however, having asked heptathlete

Jane Flemming Jane Christina Flemming (born 14 April 1965) is an Australian former Olympic track and field athlete. She completed her HSC in 1982 at Mater Christi College, Belgrave. She was the 1990 Commonwealth Games champion at heptathlon and long jum ...

to provide a substitute urine sample for the javelin thrower

Sue Howland Sue Howland (born 4 September 1960) is an Australian javelin thrower whose best result was a gold medal at the 1982 Commonwealth Games. Howland won the Australian Junior (under 20) Javelin throw in 1977 and 1978. Her international career began ...

, fearing Howland would test positive to an anabolic steroid at the Ulster Games in

Belfast Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...

on 30 June 1986. The Melbourne Track Classic featured many high level performances including continental

Oceanian records Oceania ( , ) is a region, geographical region including Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia, and Polynesia. Outside of the English-speaking world, Oceania is generally considered a continent, while Mainland Australia is regarded as its co ...

Tim Forsyth Tim Forsyth (born 17 August 1973 in Mirboo North, Victoria, Australia) is a retired Australian three-time Olympic high jumper: 1992, 1996, and 2000). Forsyth's first success on the international scene came in 1990 with a silver medal a ...

in the men's

high jump The high jump is a track and field event in which competitors must jump unaided over a horizontal bar placed at measured heights without dislodging it. In its modern, most-practiced format, a bar is placed between two standards with a crash mat f ...

Nathan Deakes Nathan Deakes (born 17 August 1977 in Geelong) is an Australian former race walker. Deakes trained with the Australian Institute of Sport. By performances, Deakes is Australia's best and most successful ever race walker, winning several inter ...

in the men's 5000 metre

walk Walking (also known as ambulation) is one of the main gaits of terrestrial locomotion among legged animals. Walking is typically slower than running and other gaits. Walking is defined as an "inverted pendulum" gait in which the body vaults over ...

, Scott Martin in the

shot put The shot put is a track-and-field event involving "putting" (throwing) a heavy spherical Ball (sports), ball—the ''shot''—as far as possible. For men, the sport has been a part of the Olympic Games, modern Olympics since their 1896 Summer Olym ...

, Lisa Corrigan in the

mile run The mile run (1,760 yards, 5,280 Foot (unit), feet, or exactly 1,609.344 metres) is a middle-distance running, middle-distance foot race. The history of the mile run event began in England, where it was used as a distance for gambling ...

and

Bronwyn Thompson Bronwyn Thompson (born 29 January 1978 in Rockhampton, Australia) is an Australian former long jumper. She was the former Commonwealth record holder and holds the Australian record for the long jump. She has been ranked as high as number two i ...

in the women's

long jump The long jump is a track and field event in which athletes combine speed, strength and agility in an attempt to leap as far as possible from a takeoff point. Along with the triple jump, the two events that measure jumping for distance as a gr ...

.Area Outdoor Records - Women - OCEANIA

IAAF World Athletics, formerly known as the International Amateur Athletic Federation and International Association of Athletics Federations and formerly abbreviated as the IAAF, is the international sports governing body, governing body for the sport ...

. Retrieved on 2011-03-05. National records have also been set at the meeting by

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...

's athletes.

Editions

Meeting records

Men

Women

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Maurie Plant Meet - Melbourne Annual track and field meetings Athletics competitions in Australia IAAF World Challenge IAAF Grand Prix IAAF World Outdoor Meetings World Athletics Continental Tour meetings