Apsley invited to Bulgaria run
IT was not just the level track of Rio that attracted international call ups – local Harrier Elizabeth Apsley has received an invitation to compete in the World Mountain Running championships in Bulgaria in September.
The Cambridge university undergraduate has received the invitation and will be participating in the junior ladies’ uphill event. It consists of a distance of 3.6 kilometres but on the course she will have to climb an elevation of no less than 531 metres in Sapareva Banya where many at the other end of the fitness spectrum take to the hot springs and sulphur treatments.
The Benson family continued to do well at both track and field events with both Holly and brother Euan impressing at the Northern inter counties competition at Hull.
The latter scored a personal best in the under 17’s hammer with a massive 22 metres and 76 centimetres throw and also participation in the shot put at county standard.
Real down to earth athletics took place at the Macclesfield Arena. Stockport Harriers, in the final senior track and field league competition, found numbers were depleted owing to the holiday period and a heavy responsibility fell on three of the competitors over the course of the afternoon’s proceedings. Road runner Tom McNally took his chances on the track at 5,000 metres to finish sixth in the “A” event but the other two competitors put folklore athlete Alf Tupper in the shade as regards their exploits.
Both Hilary West and James McKee went through the afternoon competing in five events, each as if it was a golf card with supervet West competing in all track distances from 100 metres right up to and including the 1500 metres event.
So close was the timetable between the 200 metres and the 1500 metres that she just had to jog round from the finish of one to the start of the next to carry on competing.
McKee did likewise and worked his way through the field card and participated in half of the decathlon in the process at discus, javelin, shot, long and high jumps with his two best efforts coming in the javelin with a mighty throw of 39:5 metres to record a silver medal position and he also secured the bronze spot in the high jump (1:45) for team Stockport.
Unfortunately, and with all the best efforts, it was not enough to save team Stockport from the drop to the next division but the club has been in this position before and with new development plans soon coming to fruition, they will no doubt come back fighting in next summer season’s competition.
This coming Sunday sees the annual Birchwood 10 kilometre road race promoted by Spectrum striders with a start time of 10am from Birchwood Railway Station, which will form part of the Harriers’s seasonal races competition.
Currently the time to beat for all comers is 31:26 held by Ben Fish of Blackburn Harriers and the ladies’ record is in the current possession of Stockport’s Kelly Crickmore and stands at a speedy 35:28 for the almost flat course.