The races are coming thick and fast at the moment with plenty of midweek action and this week the weekend started a day early with a fast Friday night 5k before getting into the bread and butter of the Saturday league action and Sunday road racing.
There was an open meeting at Charnwood to kick us off where Seb Palmer ran 2.26.33 for 1st place and a PB over 800m. There was more running in circles at Loughborough in a BMC Regional Meeting where Harry Dyall placed 6th over 800 in 1.55.73 and Amelia Samuels claimed a win in the 300 B mixed race in 9.10.89.
There was action around the streets of Dawley in Shropshire where the Phoenix Flyer, race two of the Sexarathon Series took place over three undulating laps of the town centre. Despite a hard session on Tuesday night Dan Turner still led the pack home in 12th place in 16.35, Jon Hart was breathing down his neck a place behind in 16.42, Ben Foster was not far adrift in 15th place in 16.52, Dylan Illidge was 28th in 17.36 and Paul Marson was 48th in 18.18. Lucy Calrow finished runner up in the ladies race after a titanic six way tussle crossing the line in 18.19 in 50th overall. Chris Apperley was 53rd in 18.21, Dave Newport 67th in 19.05, Derrick Milligan 68th in 19.05, Russ Newman 82nd in 19.35, recent signing Mark Judge was 89th in 19.49, Keith Carter just got the better of Phil Evans in 96th in 20.01 and 98th in 20.04, Dave Norman had them in sight but couldn’t get closer finishing in 20.24 to take 110th place, Pete Hood was 114th in 20.27, Stu Whitehouse placed 151st in 21.51, Sean Whitton was 156th in 21.57, Jo Lane was 221st in 24.04 and Craig Buggins was 226th in 24.20.
The action moved on to Cheshire 48 hours later with the rapid Christleton 5k attracting some quality athletes looking for fast times. Our own Jack Pickett was first over the line claiming victory is a super-fast time of 14.45. Oscar Davis was 55th in 16.05, Sam Thursfield was 70th in 16.24 backing up his efforts in the Mid Cheshire 5k a few weeks earlier.
Thoughts turned once again to the track and field on Saturday with a Midland Counties League Division 4NE fixture at Burton where the club placed 3rd on the day behind the home club Burton AC and Charnwood. Psalm Roberts-Nash was 3rd in the 100 A in 11.8 with Henry Boakye placing 2nd in 12.0 in the 100 B race and Joe Deans was 2nd in the C race in 15.6. Psalm then placed 3rd in the 200 A in 23.5, Henry was 2nd in the B race on 25.5. We had no one attempting the 400, 800, 1500 or either hurdles race. James Neilson won the 3000 A race in 9.17.3, Richard Wright was 4th in the B race in 10.20.8.
Henry had a go at the long jump finishing in 3rd with a leap of 4.39 in the A competition, Lloyd Hudson-Smith competed in the B event placing 3rd with 3.11 metres and Joe Deans was 2nd in the C comp with 2.70. Joe then threw 7.75 in the A shot for 4th place, Lloyd recorded 7.00 in the B comp for 3rd place and Craig Hancock won the C comp with 5.56. Lloyd had a go at the discuss with a 5th place finish with 19.03, Joe was 4th in the B comp with 16.64, and Craig was 3rd in the C comp with 14.09. Lloyd was 5th in the A hammer with 13.00, Craig was 4th in the B comp with 12.64 and Joe won the C comp with 11.60. Joe was 4th in the A comp in the javelin with 24.70, Lloyd was 3rd in the B event with 20.22 and Craig was 1st in the C comp with 10.83.
In the ladies competition Tammy Saunders won the 100 A race with a time of 12.6, La-Taunya Samuels also claimed the win in the B race with 13.1 and Freya Hooper made it 3 wins out of 3 with a 13.7 finish in the C race. Tammy doubled up winning the 200 A race with 26.2, Lattie won the B race in 26.8 and Freya won the C race with 28.5. Gemma Crow was 2nd in the 800 A race in 2.42.9, Audrey Wilson was 1st in the B race with 2.57.8, Audrey also claimed 4th place in the 1500 A with 6.23.4 and took 3rd in the 3000 A race with 13.38.9.
Amelia Hancock was 4th in the long jump A event with a leap on 2.98 but also turned her hand to her preferred disciplines in the throws with a 5th place in the shot-put competition with 6.99, 4th in the discus with 22.94, 4th in the hammer with 38.8 and 6th in the javelin with 7.99. Well done to all who took part and also to the officials who attended from the club to ensure we were not docked any points and gained bonuses.
And we were back on the roads again on Sunday where Dave Joynson took 1st place in his age group in the Worcester Marathon with a time of 3.15.04 in 17th place and Gillian Mitchell placed 184th in 5.32.48. At Manchester tackling the unexpected heat were Beth Tabor who finished the Great Manchester 10k in 39.22 to take 216th place and Holly Baddelley who fought off stitch to place 416th in 42.21 and over the half marathon distance Mike Webb placed 1.49.35 to take 1578th place. And just down the road, in Chester, Lesley Stamps took part in the half marathon finishing in 2.43.20 in 3213th place.
Finally, as I was waiting for track and field results to appear from the weekend we may as well include some more Wednesday action on the Shropshire fells where a trio took part in the Batch Bash, a 5.3k race with 305 metres of ascent. Dan Maskew finished in 4th place in 27.19, Beth Rawlinson was 1st lady and 13th overall in a time of 29.45 and Paul Dean was 63rd in 35.58.
Dave Norman
