The Northern Schools Inter Counties Track and Field Championships, held at Gateshead Stadium on Saturday 15th June 2019, saw hosts Northumberland win by a clear margin of 168.50 points, from Cumbria, with close rivals Durham a further two points adrift, with Cleveland finishing fourth and last. Amongst the victorious Northumberland squad were several athletes from Morpeth Harriers, six of whom were on the day winners. Five of those six recorded Field Event victories. Junior Girl Alice Geoghegan was particularly outstanding, not only recording a Javelin victory, with a best of 30.97m, which was also a new personal best, she also won the 300m, where she already has an English Schools qualifying time. On this occasion, although she was a little bit adrift of her best, she won comfortably from Cleveland’s Madeline Gillis, posting a time of 42.51s. Another Junior Girl winner was Lucy McConnell, who cleared 1.50m in the High Jump, which was a new personal best by 10cm. Although just a little bit adrift of his personal best, Ben Waterfield was a comfortable winner by a four second margin in the Intermediate Boys 800m, with his time of 2m02.78s. Back with the Field Events, and Ruaridh Lang, perhaps not unexpectedly, won the Senior Boys Discus, with his best throw of 45.26m. Jessica Gardiner won the Intermediate Girls Discus, where her best throw of 30.68m, beat Cumbria’s Abigail Wright by a good five metres. However, in her more specialised Hammer event, she came up against former North East Champion Saada Juma of Cleveland, but only lost out for victory by a margin of 73cm in a strong competition between the pair, as she achieved an on the day best of 40.91m. Another good Morpeth and Northumberland Field event result came from Junior Boy Nat Arkle, who won the Shot Putt, producing an on the day best of 11.40m, which was a Championship record, which may see the selectors take him into their considerations, when selecting the County team for the forthcoming English Schools Championships, being held in Birmingham in July. For Arkle, it was around 13cm adrift of his personal best. Although not wins, there were notable performances from Charlotte Earl, who was second in the Intermediate Girls Triple Jump with a best of 10.58m, just 8cm adrift of event winner and area colleague Lucy Errington, Rowan Bennett, who was second in the Intermediate Boys 1500m (4m15.80s), Mia Belton, who was third in the Junior Girls 100m (13.44s), David Sanderson, who was third in the Intermediate Boys Discus (32.81m), and Amy Lott,
who finished third in a very tough Intermediate Girls 80m Hurdles, clocking a time of 12.24s. Northumberland Team selectors now have till 25th June to finalise their English Schools Championship squad, for which they are allowed a total of 24 athletes to represent them. It now remains to be seen if any Morpeth Harriers have done enough to satisfy their requirements, following these performances. Despite being around four seconds adrift of his fastest time, Morpeth Harrier Rory Leonard still emerged with a great deal of credit as he finished an excellent third in the highly competitive Men’s 5000m B Race, at the BMC Grand Prix meeting, held at Loughborough on Saturday 15th June 2019
He was easily the fastest in his Under 20 age group, of which he is No1 in the UK, and is currently No 4 in Europe, and already has the required qualifying time for the European Junior Championships, being held in Boras in Sweden, exactly a week following the English Schools Championships, in which Leonard is also hoping to represent Northumberland, possibly at 1500m. On Saturday Leonard clocked a smart and steady 14m20.85s, his Father and Coach, Tony’s words, which was also faster than all but six of the 22 strong A Race Field, and was a good eight seconds faster than his closest Under 20 rival Matt Willis of Wrexham, who finished eight places behind Leonard. Another Morpeth Harrier in action at Loughborough on Saturday evening, was Under 23 Man James Young, who was recently pipped on the line for the Northern 800m title. On Saturday Young finished second in a talent filled 1500m A race, posting a finishing time of 3m45.0s, which was just a fraction down on race winner Adam Fogg, an Australian, currently competing for Coventry Godiva. Young also held off the close attentions of fellow Northerner Daniel Bebbington of Preston Harriers in the final run in. Morpeth Harriers had ten athletes in action at the third BMC Regional Meeting,
held at Chester Le Street’s Riverside Track, on the evening of Monday 17th June 2019. Fastest from the club on the night, in the events over 800m, Under 20 Man Kieran Hedley, who posted a time of 1m56.6s, when finishing fifth behind Birtley’s Adrian Bailes in the fastest event. Hedley proved to be second fastest on the night in his age group. Next fastest was Adam Pratt, who had raced over 1500m twenty-four hours earlier. In the third fastest race, he posted a seasons best of 1m59.3s, to finish third behind Houghton’s Under 20 athlete Cameron Allen. Next fastest Morpeth athlete was Under 20 Man Daniel Melling, who finished third in the fourth fastest race, posting a time of 2m02.5s, which made him eighth fastest in his age group. In his very first BMC outing, Morpeth Under 17 Man Ben Waterfield finished fifth in the second fastest race, posting a time of 2m03.2s, which made him third fastest in his age group. Morpeth’s Dylan Gooding was a clear winner of the sixth fastest race on the night, posting a personal best time of 2m07.0s, in what was his first 800m of the season. It also made him fourth fastest Under 17 Man on the night. In the eighth fastest race of the night, Morpeth Harriers had no less than four athletes in the line-up of nine. Ryan Davies was the first of the four to finish, posting a time of 2m20.8s, and was second in the race, Two places behind Ryan was older brother Dylan, who posted a new personal best time of 2m22.4s, taking a whole second off his previous figures. Finishing in eighth and ninth places were Rachelle Falloon and Rhiannon Hedley, who posted respective times of 2m25.6s and 2m26.7s. Finally, new Morpeth Harriers acquisition Michelle Thompson, formerly with North Shields Poly, finished third in the final race of the night. This was her first 800m for three years, nevertheless, she marked her club debut by posting a new personal best of 2m39.3s, which saw the Over 35 Vet take four seconds off her previous figures. At the Modern Pentathlon European Championships which were held in Kaunas, Lithuania between the 10th June and 15th June 2019. Morpeth Harrier’s Ross Charlton produced the fastest laser run in the Final of the Under 19 European Championships. Despite searing heat of 34 degrees, Ross completed the 4x800m cross country run interspersed with hitting the shooting targets in 11mins 58secs. Story of the Day Ross and team-mate George Simpson finished 7th in Monday’s U19 boys’ relay and came through qualifying on Wednesday, so they were competing for the third time this week in Kaunas. However, there was no sign of fatigue as both Brits improved on their qualifying times in the 200m swim, with George recording a 2:19.14 and Ross a long course pb of 2:20.25. It was the fencing hall that proved to be toughest for the Pentathlon GB duo, with their inexperience at international level showing. However, there was no doubting the commitment of the youngsters,
with George ending the discipline with 11 victories and Ross 6. That meant Whitgift Modern Pentathlon Academy’s George sat 35th with Pentathlon Newcastle’s Ross 36th after the opening two disciplines, with both athletes having their sights firmly set of those ahead of them in the laser run. A blistering run-shoot from 17 year old Ross, the quickest of the day saw him make-up significant ground on those around him, crossing the line 30th on just his second international appearance. A strong final discipline from George also saw him make ground as the 17-year-old ended his own major championship debut in 34th. In the U17 Boys category, another Morpeth Harrier, Sam Tate was also enjoying his first major Championship. Sam finished 36th/48 – with a fabulous 2.08 swim & 10.28 for 3x800m Laser Run. On Saturday, Sam was in action again in the mixed relay where he and partner Larissa Hannam finished a very creditable 7th. Some 34 Harriers formed part of the 4,700 who took part in the 39th running of the Blaydon Race on Sunday 9th June 2019. Unlike last year’s race - brought forward to a rather sticky Saturday afternoon because of Ed Sheeran’s later appearance at St. James’ Park - there were no competing events to factor in this year, and the race started at the very civilised time of 7.15 pm when the day had mostly cooled off, although runners did report bright sun on the Scotswood Road and probably reduced levels of support. A delayed entry in February had led to rumours of the race not taking place at all; not so, but a slightly different finish this year – outside Morrisons in Blaydon – meant the race was a touch shorter than in previous years (some 5.4 miles in total), with no children’s race and restricted space at the Blaydon end. Runners who had lined up back on Grey Street (now the assembly area instead of the old Bigg Market) also complained of having to stand stock still, having crossed the chip mats, for up to two minutes at the bottom of Collingwood Street as the field tried to negotiate the left-right turn around the new paved area. At the sharp end meanwhile, a leading group of some fifteen men quickly established itself with Carl Avery, second last year, and a returning Nick Swinburn (sporting his NEFRA vest) prominent, along with Graham Rush of Leeds City, Dom Shaw of New Marske and Charlie Hulse of Liverpool. With the group slowly whittling itself down as the pace cranked up, in the end it was a straight fight between Avery and Rush, with the Leeds man winning out in the end by a margin of no more than twenty metres. Rush was credited with 25 minutes 33 seconds and Carl had once again to settle for second in 25m 37s, with Hulse in third (25m 45s). Leading Morpeth finishers thereafter were Nick Swinburn, 5th in 26m 17s, Sam Hancox, 11th in 27m 2s, Tom Straughan, 14th in 27m 37s, John Butters, 19th and 3rd Over 40 male in 28m 8s and Adam Pratt, 24th in 28m 15s. Other notable achievements were Dan Melling, 30th overall in his first Blaydon, who achieved the distinction of winning the Geordie Ridley trophy as 1st Under 19 with a time of 28m 31s, and Lee Bennett, having a fine year so far, 44th but 1st Over 50 in 29m 20s. Despite Nick not counting for the team, Morpeth look to have won both the Senior Men’s and the Veteran Men’s titles. Other Morpeth times included: Mark Snowball, 36th in 28m 57s; Richard Johnson, 38th in 29m 3s; Fergus Bates, 3rd 0/50 in 30m 58s and 89th; Matthew Boyle, 96th in 31m 11s; Paul Banks 154th in 32m 20s; Shaun Land, 163rd in 32m 27s; Jamie Johnson, 179th in 32m 49s; Rob Hancox, 192nd and 8th 0/50 in 33m; Mike Winter, 282nd in 34m 11s; Neil Gunstone, up from his London base to finish in 309th in 34m 40s; Eric Adams 341st in 35m 2s; Gary Hall, 358th in 35m 16s; Jim Alder, 420nd in 35m 54s; Paul Bellingham, 447th in 36m 8s and Norman Clark, 1073rd and 4th 0/65 in 40m 44s. Olympian and Sunderland Stroller Alyson Dixon, now an Over 40 veteran, was a convincing winner of the women’s race in a time of 28m 24s with Claire Duck of Leeds City 2nd in 28m 54s and Wallsend’s Danielle Hodgkinson,
last year’s winner, in 3rd. There was a good run by Morpeth’s Robyn Bennett, however, who was 6th overall and 4th Senior in 31m 16s and she was just ahead of Jane Hodgson, 8th and 4th veteran woman in 31m 32s. Thereafter Rachelle Falloon was 19th and 12th Senior (33m 8s) and Gemma Floyd 20th and 3rd 0/40 in 33m 16s and Helen King 32nd and 7th 0/40 in 34m 17s. Jane Kirby was 388th in 45m 16s. The club was unfortunate in that the four to count for the team prize cannot include veteran women, so narrowly missed out. |
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