This Saturday will see the Victorian Athletic League celebrate a mammoth 2025-26 season with its annual awards night, and after recording its most successful season to date, and by some margin, too, it’s no surprise that Seymour’s Kelfit stable has secured a slew of nominations.

With 18 wins under its belt across the campaign, including two at the famed Stawell Gift, a massive step up considering it had never crossed the double-digit threshold prior, the squad has earned a collective eight nominations ahead of the event this Saturday, July 11 at the Brighton Beach Hotel in Melbourne, much to the delight of trainer Kelvin Lubeck.

“Our season was, as you know, the most wins we’ve ever had, so we couldn’t be happier,” Lubeck said, following the nominee announcements.

“Just to be nominated is a bit of a buzz for everyone, but we’ll see what happens in a couple of days’ time.”

The nominations are led by Lubeck himself, who is once again up for the VAL Trainer of the Year award, an accolade he claimed in 2024.

It would be just reward for a superb campaign that saw his group go toe-to-toe with the best squads in the VAL, often coming out ahead, but a season in which he also had to contend with the rapid growth of his stable, and the challenges that presented.

“It was a little bit more challenging, the one-on-one sort of dropped away a bit,” he said.

“But just the way the group was, they just pushed each other week in, week out, so that's a massive tick for the group itself.

“It’s probably not really my doing, but you couldn't train a better group of people.”

Headlining the athlete nominations among the Kelfit group is Lucy Zotti, who enjoyed a breakout season in the VAL, and has been duly rewarded with four nominations.

Winning five times in 2025-26, Zotti claimed a maiden Stawell sash and triumphed over the 120m, 300m, 400m and 800m distances in a stunning campaign, leading her to be nominated for both the Female Distance Athlete of the Year and Female Sprinter of the Year awards.

Her 400m/800m double at the Seymour Gift, which kicked off her winning streak, has seen her named as a finalist in the Female Performance of the Year award, while her brilliant season overall has earned her a nod for the biggest accolade of them all, the VAL Athlete of the Year gong, in which she is the only female nominee.

Having finished as runner-up on six occasions in 2024-25 without claiming a win, the campaign represented a massive breakthrough for Zotti, and Lubeck was full of praise for the way she approached it this season.

“Her mental approach this year has been first class, and that’s the key to her, there is no doubt about it,” Lubeck said.

“She would attend a meet full of confidence that she knew she could win on the day.

“The second last meet of the season at Ringwood, only a couple of Kelfit athletes went, but as soon as I got there, there was no way known she was going to lose that.

“She was just so confident in herself that she was going to win that 300 metre race, and that's been the massive improvement, her mental attitude has been first class.

“There's no different training methods, everything about it was the same as what we've been doing in the past, it’s just that her mental attitude definitely changed.”

While Zotti’s four nominations are the most among the Seymour-based crew, another two Kelfit athletes are also in the running to pick up silverware, including Olivia Attard, who will be up against her stablemate in defence of her Female Distance Athlete of the Year crown.

While running a lot of Athletics Victoria meets rather than VAL events may have seen her season go a little underrated by some, Attard still notched a win in the VAL over 800m at the Frankston Gift in January and made the podium of the 800m final at Stawell.

“There is no better person that I've ever trained than her,” Lubeck said of Attard’s professional approach.

“She’s so mentally prepared and physically prepared herself, it’s first class. She’s 27, she’s not 21, so she’s in the prime of her career right now.”

Newcomer Declan Goodwin rounds out the squad’s athlete nominations, with the first-year Kelfit athlete up for the title of Male Distance Athlete of the Year, having won twice throughout the season and finished second over 1600m at Stawell.

Based in Lara, just north of Geelong, Goodwin is already an impressive athlete, but according to Lubeck, he has so much room for improvement, which is a scary proposition for his competitors.

“He’s definitely got a lot of technical problems,” Lubeck said.

“He’s got a lot of movement in his shoulders and his head, and he hasn’t got a very good knee lift.

“So I’m so keen, because if he can work on those one percenters, he’ll be even better.

“Early call, I think he’ll win Stawell next season. It’s a very early call, but he will win at Stawell next season because he’s so competitive, he just wants to get better.”

To be up for so many awards is a dream scenario for the Kelfit group, but as a wider Seymour Running Club, the fact that the Seymour Gift is again up for Race Meeting of the Year, having won the award in its first season back on the calendar last year, is the cherry on top.

“As a Seymour Running Club committee, it’s another feather in our cap,” Lubeck said.

“The town has got behind the Seymour Gift, and that’s been the biggest success.

“The Seymour Racing Club hold the Seymour Cup, and I know it’s only been going two years, but this would be the next biggest thing in Seymour.

“The Seymour people have backed it, so we can’t thank them enough, and all the sponsors.

“Eventually, it probably won't happen in my lifetime, but it’s Stawell in autumn, we want Seymour in summer to be just as big.

“That’s the long-term goal, and the committee and the people involved right now, if they stay, it could happen.”

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Wednesday, 13th March 2030

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