The Northern Athletics Autumn Road Relays took place on Sunday 24 September in Birkenhead Park on the Wirral. A four-hour there and four-hour back journey for runners from the North East, but the club did manage to field teams in the U/15 Girls and the U/17 Boys, along with two teams in the Senior Men’s race.
First up were the U/15 Girls, who finished a very respectable 20th of some 40 teams, with runs from Emma Tomlinson (13:17), Megan Potrac (14:01) and Molly Roche (13:19). Winners were local outfit Liverpool Harriers and AC, with Lincoln Wellington 2nd and Sale Harriers 3rd. The day’s medal-winning performance came courtesy of the club’s U/17 Boys who, while not quite able to match the winning performance of last year’s team, still came away with a hard-fought team Bronze behind winners Blackburn Harriers with City of York AC second. Elliot Kelso ran 11:58 on leg three to get the team into a medal position, which was also the team’s fastest time of the day and the 5th fastest run overall, after earlier legs by Joe Close (12:06) and Oliver Tomlinson (12:28). Morpeth’s Senior Men were unfortunate to miss out on medal in the day’s final event, the six-stage relay, contested by some 100 clubs from across the whole of the North of England. A flying Rory Leonard, currently in very fine form, had got the team into contention on leg 3 with what proved to be the fastest time of the day for the 5k course, 13:55, after earlier legs by Sam Hancox (15:17) and Will de Vere Owen (15:15). Thereafter it proved to a very close tussle, with runs by Finn Brodie (15:02), Peter Smallcombe (15:37) and Will Cork (15:16) saw the club only slipping out of 3rd on the last leg and missing out on a medal by only some 17 seconds (1:30:22) to Sheffield’s Hallamshire Harriers (1:30:05), with a dominant performance by winners Leeds City AC (1:28:15) and local outfit Liverpool Harriers (1:29:42) in second. There was also a taste of top-level racing for five of the club’s B team, all competing for the first time in a Senior outfit. After experienced Alistair Douglas had got the team going on leg 1 (15:49), an unfortunate mix up on the changeover saw Liam Roche timed at 19:23, although his actual run time was much faster. Thereafter it was catch up time with the next four out managing to get the team back into 31st place overall (1:39:26) with runs by teenagers James Tilley (15:48), Bertie Marr (16:14), Ethan Phillips (16:01) and Tom Balsdon (16:11). Disappointment was replaced by relief in the evening as it was confirmed that the club had qualified their B team for the National event in two weeks time. North East wise, Sunderland Harriers were well-placed in 14th with Tyne Bridge, for whom the redoubtable Jarlath Mckenna ran first leg despite running also in the NEHL the previous afternoon, 20th . TBH B team were 49th. Gateshead didn’t travel. Action moves on to the National Six Stage in a matter of weeks, where the club hopes to be also in contention. Well done all who made the journey, and special thanks to on the day team manager Julie Roche. The first round of the NEHL cross country season for 23/24 takes place this coming
Saturday (23 rd September) at Wrekenton. The full list of registered runners for the club is available here at http://www.harrierleague.com/runners/2023-24/Morpeth%20Harriers%20&%20AC.htm (Please note if you are NOT registered for this one, you can’t be entered on the day; however, we can register you for the next one at Druridge Bay.) Timings are the same as last season, with the first race off, the Under 11s, at midday and the timings all here: 12.00 Under 11 Boys 12.05 Under 11 Girls 12.15 Under 17 men 12.20 U17 and U20 women 12.35 Under 15 Boys 12.40 Under 15 Girls 12:50 Under 13 boys 12:55 Under 13 girls 13.05 Senior & veteran women 13:50 Senior & veteran men As ever, parking can be tight at these events, so please give yourself time to get parked up, collect number and get warmed up. Parking is available at Cardinal Hume Catholic School, Old Durham Road, postcode NE9 6RZ, though some parking is usually available on the Beacon Lough estate. Best route from Morpeth is usually over the Tyne Bridge, then picking up the signs for Queen Elizabeth Hospital – the school and course are only a few hundred yards after this. Toilets available at the course (though always worth bringing own extra loo roll!). Wrekenton has usually tended to be quite firm going under foot, but it may be worthwhile bringing spikes and trail shoes, if you have them, although the course will also be fine in ordinary shoes. Look for club tent and flag – we will be there unseasonably early, as ever! Further information is likely to be on the NEHL website or on the NEHL Facebook page. It’s always good to get off to a good start and part of the success in XC is, of course, in the numbers, so let’s aim for a big turn out in blue and white whatever the weather. Thropton Show was the latest in the season of Northumberland shows, Saturday’s
events including once again the challenging six mile fell race. Heaton Harrier Chris Larkin was overall winner in 49:39 with members of Morpeth Harriers finishing in 3 rd , 4 th and 5 th places behind. Over 40 John Butters placed 3 rd in 57:02 with KEVI sixth former Liam Roche (1:00:26) coming in 4 th . Once again Cat Macdonald, looking very strong ahead of the season’s first cross country fixture next weekend, was fastest female finisher, 5 th overall in 1:00:43 with father Alistair 7 th in 1:01:36. Jane Hodgson was back to winning ways in Sunday’s 42 nd Northumberland Coastal
Run from Beadnell to Alnmouth. This year’s event felt slightly different, with the race moved to September from its traditional spot in July due to bird nesting at the Long Nanny Bird Sanctuary in Beadnell, but it was very much of a case of normal service resumed at the sharp end, with off road specialist and last year’s winner Jarlath Mckenna, now with Tyne Bridge Harriers, romping home in a time of 1 hour 18 minutes 15 seconds, ahead of Blyth’s Michael Stott (1:19:36) and Heaton’s Eddie Knight (1:22:22). There was however a remarkable 6 th victory in the event for Jane, who has very much made the course her own over the years and probably now deserves the title ‘Queen of the Coastal’. This time she placed a remarkable 13 th overall in a time of 1:30:42 with nearest rival Tyne Bridge Harrier Rebecca Blain nearly five minutes behind (1:35:33) and last year’s winner Judith Nutt of Elswick 3 rd (1:37:30). Morpeth’s Shaun Land was first male home from the club, making the top twenty in 18 th place (1:33:00) and picking up a prize as 3 rd Senior. There were 478 finishers. It was good to see Steve Haswell back in competitive action too, 56 th in 1:42:26, with Dave Nicholson 114 th and 3 rd O/65 in 1:51:29, John Clark 123 rd in 1:53:20 and Gary Mason 196 th in 2:0053. Anna Wright and Jane Briggs both picked up prizes, Anna coming back in 71 st place and picking up a 2 nd O/40 prize into the bargain (1:45:20) and Jane 143 rd and 2 nd 0/50 in 1:55:35. Fran Naylor was 373 rd in 2:23:18. Finishing fifth in the Modern Pentathlon Junior World Championships at Druskininkai, Lithuania at the weekend, Ross Charlton also took his share of a well won Team Silver with his GB colleagues. With all four members of the team having made it through the qualifying rounds held earlier in the week, some thirty six competitors lined up for Saturday’s final. Charlton began the event well, scoring nineteen wins against sixteen defeats in the fencing and adding a further three victories in the bonus round. The day’s second challenge was the relatively new Obstacle Course Racing, due to replace the traditional Horse Riding after 2024’s Paris Olympics. However, as Pentathlon GB have twin tracked Ross as both a Junior and a Senior competitor, he had largely focused on Show Jumping this year while many of his younger rivals had practised extensively over the new OCR. All of this meant he remained a relative novice over the format and posted a fairly modest time of 44 seconds. He slipped further back down the leader board in the 200m freestyle swim, falling to 28th place after the third of the five events with only the combined 3000m Laser Run still to come. Always a fine runner from his early days with Morpeth Harriers, where he formed part of a group that included triathlete Dan Dixon and which was coached by the late Tony Ward, Charlton stormed to the fastest time of the competition, 9 minutes 47 seconds, only a second outside of his own Junior World Record. The run took him to 5th place overall and only 11 seconds off the podium, Ross first home for Team GB, whose next 6th and 11th individual places meant the team finished in 2nd place behind winners France with Ukraine 3rd . A delighted Ross is now looking forward to a couple of weeks of well earned rest and recuperation before resuming his training with an eye on 2024. |
Archives
July 2024
|