The traditional first day on Saturday 17th February, at the annual North Eastern Counties Athletics Association Indoor Championships, reserved for Field Eventers, and held at Gateshead College, produced no fewer than six individual medals for Morpeth Harriers, two of them Gold.
Gold Medals went to Under 17 athletes Andrew Knight and Ethan Stephenson. In Knight’s case, he not only broke the Indoor Championship record with his best Putt of 15.33m in the Shot, which incredibly bettered the old figures by a whole metre, it was also the youngster’s third longest distance ever. Stephenson took his Gold Medal in the Triple Jump, producing a best performance of 12.24m, bettering his old figure of 12.14m, that he achieved in last months Northern U17/U20 Championships in Sheffield. He also won Silver in the Long Jump, producing a best of 5.68m. Morpeth’s remaining three medals were all Silver, being produced by Craig Charlton, Koffi Avornyo and Jacob Clayton. Charlton produced an Indoor Best of 13.94m in the Senior Shot Putt, finishing second to Thames Valley’s former Gateshead Harrier Craig Sturrock. Avornyo cleared 1.50m, to claim his Silver in the Under 15 Boys High Jump, and Clayton added to his clubs’ impressive medals tally in the Under 15 Boys Triple Jump, producing a best of 10.07m. Two more medals were won by Morpeth Harrier athletes on the second day of competition on Sunday 18th February, which was for track eventers. Amy Lott achieved two personal bests, which included a championship record en-route to winning a superb Gold Medal in the Under 15 Girls 60m Hurdles. She won her earlier run heat in 9.49s, however her superb run of 9.27s gave her a well-deserved Gold Medal, plus achieving a championship record was indeed an icing on the cake. Another Morpeth Harrier competing in the 60m Hurdles was Alice Geoghegan, who went out in the same heat that Lott won in 9.49s, when finishing fourth in 10.79s. Morpeth’s other medallist on the day was Harriet Priest, who won a Silver in the Under 20 Women’s 60m in 10.89s, which equalled her personal best. Ellie Longstaff narrowly just missed out on a medal in the final of the Under 15 Girls 60m, when finishing fourth in 8.4s. Longstaff had finished second in her heat in 8.51s and had won her Semi Final in 8.36s. The latter had represented a new personal best performance. Other Morpeth athletes competing in the Under 15 Girls 60m were Rosie Winter, who made it through to the final, only to place sixth, posting a time of 8.5s, which was a marginal personal best. Winter had earlier finished second in her heat, and third in her Semi Final, with similarly run times. Alice Geoghegan, Amy Lott, and Mia Belton of Morpeth also competed in the 60m, however all three failed to reach the final, after going out in the Semi’s. Lott won her heat in 8.52s, however 8.55s in the Semi’s saw her eliminated. Geoghegan finished fifth in her Semi with 8.75s, and Belton finished third in her Semi, just behind Lott in 8.58s, which was a personal best performance. A unique blend of young and old captured medals for Morpeth Harriers at the annual Royal Signals Road Relays, incorporating the North East Athletics Association Championships, held at a sunny but cold Hetton Lyons Country Park, Hetton Le Hole, County Durham on Saturday 17th February 2018. In the Senior Men’s event, run over 6 Stages, each covering a distance of 2.2mile, Morpeth retained the winners title for the fourth consecutive year, courtesy of Kieran Hedley (10m58s), Karl Taylor (11m11s), Sam Hancox (11m27s), Lewis Timmins (11m02s), Ian Harding (10m59s), and Thomas Straughan, who had run in Armagh in Ireland less than 48 hours previous, who clocked 11m00s, to bring the squad home nearly two minutes clear of second placed Tyne Bridge Harriers, with Tees-side based club New Marske taking the bronze medals, a further 83 seconds adrift. The Morpeth Harriers Senior Men’s B team, who finished 20th overall, and as 18th Senior Team, would not have finished at all, had Veteran Man Paul Brown not jumped off his administration stool at the last moment to ensure that they finished as a complete squad. With little or no warm up, plus missing his actual start, he got around showing an individual time of 17m17s, very much against a running clock, to support the earlier efforts of Under 17 athlete Taylor Glover (11m08s), Alistair Douglass (11m29s), Andrew Hebden (12m49s), Andrew Lawrence (11m42s), and Mark Snowball (12m06s). Morpeth’s Over 40 Veteran Men ran superbly to figure amongst the medals, finishing second to Sunderland Harriers in their category, courtesy of Rob Hancox (13m28s), Graeme Thorpe (12m35s), Paul Waterston (13m14s), John Butters, a truly excellent fastest Veteran time of (11m26s), Tim Miley (13m25s), and Fergus Bates (12m36s). They had also achieved this by using Over 50 Veterans Hancox, nursing a hamstring injury, and Waterston, plus Miley, who is an Over 55 Veteran, and all three had been willing to step down in age to compete with younger counterparts in the quest for medals. The result had proved most positive, which delighted a much-beleaguered Morpeth Veteran Men’s Team Manager Peter Scaife, who had faced some last-minute dropouts from his original Over 50 line-ups, which we shall report upon later in this article. A mere nineteen seconds disappointingly robbed Morpeth Harriers Senior Women from retaining their North East title for the third successive year in their four-stage contest.
Despite excellent running by Holly Peck (13m30s), Catriona MacDonald (12m57s), Gracie Hufton(14m00s), and Team Captain Emma Holt (12m24s), they just couldn’t quite match the later power of Jarrow and Hebburn. It was however Peck’s very first run in a Senior competition, and for her and Hufton, their very first sharing of Senior medals, albeit Silver on this occasion. Holt was second fastest on the day behind seasoned International Aly Dixon, who posted 11m53s for Sunderland Strollers, who were third placed Women’s Veteran team, thus making Holt the fastest Senior. In the Veteran Women’s event, Morpeth Harriers finished eighth, courtesy of Vicky Gibbs (14m23s), who was making a competitive comeback, Jane Briggs (16m17s), Helen King (14m40s), and Gemma Floyd (14m53s). Morpeth Harriers also had some incomplete teams in action for their Over 50 Men, which we referred to earlier in this article, along with an incomplete team in the Senior Women’s competition. Due to last minute injury and illness dropouts, Peter Scaife only had Alistair MacDonald and Gavin Bayne to call into their line-up, which was very unfortunate, because with two more relatively strong team colleagues, they may well have been possible medal contenders in the age group. Meanwhile Alison Brown, Sue Smith, and Pam Woodcock lined up in an incomplete Senior Women’s squad. Unfortunately the results from these were unavailable at the time of going to press. Morpeths Phillip Winkler took part in the BUCS Track and Field Championships
at Sheffield Arena on Saturday 17th February 2018. The Leeds Beckett student finished sixth in his heat of the Senior Men’s 1500m, posting a seasons best of 4m06.40s. Ady Whitwam of Morpeth Harriers finished tenth in the Wokingham Half Marathon,
on Sunday 18th February 2018, posting a time of 71m30s, and he was second Over 40 Veteran Man.
Brooks Armagh 3K International Road Race 2018
Posting a finishing time of 8m59s, Morpeth’s Laura Weightman retained her 3k title in the high-profile Brooks sponsored International Women’s event in Armagh, Ireland on the evening of Thursday 15th February 2018. She won with four seconds to spare over Chelmsford’s Jessica Judd, with Swansea’s Verity Ockenden a further eleven seconds adrift in third place. Weightman, recently returned from warm weather training in South Africa, in preparation for her forthcoming Commonwealth Games appearance in Australia’s Gold Coast in April, was well satisfied with her run, and admitted being very much pushed all the way to the finish line by Judd, as she equalled her 2017 clocking. 132 athletes took part in the Women’s 3k event.
Brooks Armagh 5K International Road Race 2018
Northern Cross-Country Champion Carl Avery, led a trio of Morpeth Harriers home in the Men’s 5k event, when he finished 50th behind Wreake and Soar Valley’s Sam Stabler. Avery clocked a finishing time of 14m36s, which was a mere second outside his personal best. Other Morpeth Harriers finishers in the 208-strong event were Chris Smith (110th) 15m06s, Ross Floyd (113th) 15m06s, and Thomas Straughan (136th) 15m15s. All of these performances represented new personal bests, in Straughan’s case he took exactly one second off his previous figures.
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