Steeplechase star Owen sets personal best and club record
DAN Owen set a new personal best and Cheltenham Harriers club record as he took victory in the 2000m steeplechase at the British Milers Club Grand Prix in Manchester.
Having won his opening two races of the season, Owen followed pacemaker Chris Perry from the gun as looked to attack the 5:49.1 PB that he set last summer.
After one lap, Owen and Poole’s Jamie Grose pulled clear and the pair tracked Perry until he stepped aside after 1200m.
Dom James contested the 5000m C race where he passed through 3000m in under nine minutes before having to settle for 11th in a new track personal best of 15:16.42.
Richard de-camps raced in the BMC regional event in Tipton where he finished seventh in the 3000m A race in a time of 8:47.73.
Six Harriers lined up in the London 10K road race won by Sir Mo Farah.
Phil Beastall went through halfway in 15:02 on his way to a time of 30:32 as he came home in 34th places.
Chris Booth took 16 seconds off his PB for 33:02, with Dan Thomas not far behind in 33:18 before Steve Linton (37:02), Matt Lambourne (39:05) and Clark Lawson (39:12) completed the Cheltenham contingent.
In the previous day’s Westminster Mile series Lambourne set a personal best of 5:03 whilst in the Masters races V60 runner Nick Holliday recorded 5:33, LV45 athlete Caroline Cotterell posted 5:59 and LV60 runner Kathryn Morton stopped the clock at 6:41.
In Herefordshire there was a win for Jon Barnes in the Crocodile 8 mile mult-terrain race and James Bingham contested the Edinburgh Half Marathon where he recorded a time of 76:42 for 29th place whilst Dave Tomlin finished fourth at the Dymock Half Marathon.
At the Weston Prom 5 mile road race Dan Schofield finished 12th in 30:09 whilst Melanie Mosi crossed the line in 39:08.
The weekend’s parkruns saw Beth Hawling (18:45) finish as first lady and seventh overall at the Hampstead Heath event whilst Doug Wight (17:02) finished second in Cheltenham where Henry James (18:42) placed eighth.
There was also a second place for Mark James (17:38) at Worcester Pitchcroft whilst Dave Tomlin (19:44) finished third at the challenging Churchfields Farm event in Droitwich, Gareth Edwards (18:12) took fifth position in Winchester and Georgia Palmer (22:24) was the seventh lady home in Southsea.