Pontefract bronze for young Harriers
IN a cold and windy Pontefract, Stockport fielded some great teams at the North of England Cross Country Championships.
Out of a field of 208, Freya Murdoch finished 6th and led her team of Sophie Ellwood, Saffron Meade and Ella Buckley to win Bronze in the U13 Girls race.
The U13 Boys weren’t able to field a full team but William Bailey (32nd) and Harvey Murphy (90th) both had gutsy races on a tough and fast course. Esther Hulley was the sole Stockport contender in the U15 Girls race, finishing 99th.
Finley Mayoh was also the only Harrier in the U15 Boys race, placing 43rd out of 100.
Alice Davies placed 35th, Lauren Burgess 64th and Mollie Cooke 85th in the U17 Women’s race. The U17 Men also missed out on fielding a full team but Ben Batho (52nd) and Harry Miller-Reedman (128th) put in great performances.
The Senior Women’s race saw 376 competitors in total and Stockport’s ladies made up a team with Lizzy Apsley running a great race to come 35th, Louise Geldart taking 150th, Rebekah Livsey coming in 330th and Alexis Dinsmor in 346th. The Senior men raced 12km in the final race of the day.
The start was a spectacle with 700 runners entering the initial stampede at the sound of the gun. Stockport entered a very strong but incomplete team made up of Jack Martin (4th), Jack Nixon (24th), Jack Morris (39th) and Andrew Nixon (115th).
Nine Athletes travelled up to Glasgow to compete in Scottish National Indoor Championships.
In the field there were some great jumps with Lucy Salter taking home Under 17 Triple Jump Silver with a PB of 11.38m and following that up with an equally impressive 5.49m PB to take Long Jump Bronze.
Abi Pawlett took Silver in that Long Jump competition with a highly credible 5.85m, just 4cm behind Scotland’s Ellie O’Hara in excess of the previous Championship Record of 5.63m. Grace Goodsell continues her comeback following meniscus surgery last year, jumping another strong series with a best of 5.43m, just a few centimetres short of the medals in a high quality competition.
With the Scottish Under 20 Championships taking place on a different weekend, Katie Waterworth and Megan Lasseter competed up an age group in the Senior Women’s Competition with Katie struggling with the hard and fast surface but still jumping just 10cm shy of her PB with 5.64m for 6th place. Megan jumped a PB of 5.41m and finished 9th, just missing the cut before producing a second PB of the day with 11.32m in the Triple Jump for 5th place.
In the Shot Put, Sanna McLean (also competing up an age with the Seniors) threw her most consistent series since moving up to the 4kg weight with a best throw of 9.37m for 5th place.
On the track, Abi ran an excellent series of hurdles races despite long start line delays in the heat and semi to twice beat the previous Championship Record of 8.70, running 8.64 in the Semis and 8.63 in the final. Lucy just missed the final but ran two PBs of 9.36 and 9.31 through the rounds.
In the 300m, Emily Mis- ●●Mike Durcan antoni ran her first Championships for more than a year and competing for the first time since injury earlier this month, ran two great preliminary rounds before taking Bronze medal in a strong final. Olivia Ashdown was competing in her first ever National Championships of any kind and followed up a good performance at the Northerns with another Indoor PB and first indoor sub-43 run with 42.99 to make the semis and just miss out on the final.
To finish the day, Holly Murray led from gun to tape in both her heat and semi-final, running controlled races of 26.55 and 25.41 before running an indoor PB of 25.27 to take the Silver Medal behind defending Champion Alyson Bell in the 200m.
It is regretted that two former chairmen of Stockport Harriers have recently passed away and their contributions to the local athletic club scene will be sorely missed.
Firstly, Peter O`Hare who was chairman for two years in the early nineties and had an insatiable enthusiasm for marathons and half marathons including the tour of Tameside.
Peter is the only person known locally who has gone through a complete calendar year and undertaken a race every week, a feat which is unlikely to be accomplished again in a hurry. Peter was a stalwart of East Cheshire Harriers and then followed it up with a valuable period of time at Stockport Harriers before commencing his own running group in the Hyde area and taking time to coach many athletes up to good road, trail and fell racing levels.
Mike Durcan was Stockport`s longest serving chairman by far from the beginning of the new century right through to only a couple of years ago and his star attraction was his trademark red beret which was an easy way of picking him out in the London marathon which he enjoyed on many occasions.
His main training centre was from Jackson`s Lane recreation centre, Hazel Grove where he was known by athletes far and wide from that area and another regular training area was to take to the canal tow path and the Middlewood Way in the Marple area where he