Places secured at Birmingham
THE Greater Manchester County Schools Track & Field Championships took place earlier this month at Stretford.
This is an exciting event as qualifying athletes go on to compete for Greater Manchester at the InterCounty Championships in Birmingham.
Rosie Lasseter was the first county champion of the day with a win in the Under 15 Girls Hammer Throw with a distance of 34.79m, ensuring her place on the Greater Manchester team.
Holly Benson won the Under 17 Girls Shot Put convincingly with a throw of 12.27m, a clear 2m ahead of Sophie Tilley from Sale Harriers who placed second, and a qualifying distance for the Inter-Counties.
Joining Rosie and Holly in donning a Greater Manchester vest will be Evie Wild who continues to dominate in the Under 17 Girls High Jump this season and won with a jump of 1.55m.
Rebecca Cox also had a fantastic result and took first place with in the Under 15 Girls High Jump with a Personal Best of 1.50m.
Hannah Walker claimed a Personal Best in the Under 15 Girls High Jump with 1.30m. ●●Holly Benson, winner of Under 17 Girls Shot Put at GM Championships
In an exciting final round, Megan Lasseter took gold in the Under 17 Girls Long Jump with 5.27 and will also be representing Greater Manchester in Birmingham with hopes of being selected to go to the English Schools County Championships. Competing in the Under ●●Evie Wild takes Gold in Under 17 Girls High Jump at GM Schools Championships 17 Womens Javelin was Bethan Kelly who achieved an amazing Personal Best of 37.61, over 11m further than second place and a well-deserved Greater Manchester vest.
Jack Doodson performed well, taking second place in the Under 15 Boys Long Jump with a ●●Megan Lasseter, winner of Under 17 Girls Long Jump at GM Championships distance of 5.33m.
Daisy Keigher and Melissa Rose Cox both competed in the Under 15 Girls Long Jump with Daisy placing 4th and Melissa placing 9th with a Personal Best of 4.35m.
Competing across the border in the Cheshire County Schools Championship was Emma Jackson who took silver and earned a huge Personal Best of 25.59m in the Under 15 Girls Javelin, earning Emma a place on the Cheshire team at the Inter-Counties.
Senior athletes also had a great weekend at the Northern Athletics Senior and Under 20s Track & Field Championships on Sunday 10th June 2018 at Sportcity, Manchester.
Stand out performances of the day came from George Cooke who became the new Under 20 Mens Northern 5000m Champion with a winning time of 15min57:80secs and Natasha Harrison who won the U20 Womens 400m and set a new championship record of 50:03secs.
Luke Farrant placed 5th in the Under 20 Mens 800m final with a time of 1min59:40secs. Euan Benson came 2nd in the Under 20 Mens Hammer Throw final with a throw of 22.80m.
In the Under 20 Womens 200m final, Holly Murray and Abigail Pawlett placed 4th and 5th respectively.
Emily Misantoni took bronze in the Under 20 Womens 400m Hurdles final with a fantastic time of 64.60secs, although she finished first in the qualifying heat with 63.90secs.
The third installment of the North Cheshire 5k Grand Prix series took place at Bowdon on Thursday 7 June 2018, hosted by Spectrum Striders RC and Altrincham & District AC.
These are short and sweet trail races taking place at five separate locations across Cheshire.
Prizes are up for grabs for individual race and series wins.
Stephen Crook was on his usual excellent form and managed to finish in 5th place with an astonishing time of 16mins55secs. Those who run Park Run on a regular basis will know that finishing a 5k in sub-20 minutes is no easy feat, especially off-road.
However, Steve Shaughnessy also managed to sneak in under the 20 minute mark in 30th place and with a time of 19mins 33secs.
Stockport stalwart Alexis Dinsmoor and Vet 65 finished in 136th place with a great time of 27mins 47secs.
Sometimes, Stockport Harriers will enter events that make the rest of us question their sanity.
One such event is the Comrades Marathon, also known as ‘The Ultimate Human Race’.
Starting in Pietermaritzburg and ending in Durban, South Africa, the Comrades Marathon is misleadingly named as it covers a distance of about 89km.
The overall winner, Bongmusa Mthemba from South Africa, ran at an incomprehensible average speed of 3:38 min/km to finish in 5hrs 26min 34secs.
Three brave Harriers made the long journey and not only competed but completed the race.
Stephen Jones was the first Harrier over the line in a time of 8hrs 27mins 33secs.
In hot pursuit was Jayne Lawton who also place 104th female and 37th in her age category with an amazing time of 8hrs 32mins 23secs.
The trio was completed by Thomas Burke who finished in 9hrs25mins34secs.Huge congratulations go to all three Harriers and hopefully the blisters will start to heal soon!