The projected wind and rain wasn’t as bad as first expecteed as a large number of athletes from clubs around the North West, lined up for the North West Road Relays at Birkenhead Park on Sunday September 14th. Blackburn Harriers had teams out in all age groups, both male and female with the exception of the U11’s and it has to be said that the field for this age category was large and good to see with 19 clubs all entering teams. It was a good day for the Club, picking up medals in a number of age group categories, topped with a win by the Senior Men who won by over a minute from Salford Harriers in 2nd and Rossendale in 3rd. The team led off by Daniel Bebbington (13.57), Joe Monk (14.37), Ross Harrison (14.17), Matt Ramsden (13.59) also featured the two fastest legs of the day with Daniel taking the honours for the North West overall. The team also won the Lancashire title from Rossendale in 2nd and Blackburn Harriers B team in 3rd which had Andy Benson on Leg 1 (14.52), Ben Makin Leg 2 (15.09), Jack Lamb on Leg 3 (16.01) and Oliver Gill on the final Leg (15.15). The B team placed 11th overall in the North West and 7th in Lancashire with our C team of Danny Maynard (18.24), Ethan Cutler (16.25), Logan McCredie (16.30), Ismael Alvarez El Hassany on the final leg (15.48). The Club’s D team of James Bretherton (15.20), Nick Gaskell (17.43), Chris Davies (16.41), Marco Pacelli (18.20) came home in 44th overall and 8th in Lancashire.
L-R Joe Monk – Ross Harrison – Matt Ramsden – Daniel Bebbington
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At the start of the day, the U13 Girls came 29th overall and 5th in Lancashire with Sophie Douglas running 10.00, Jenna McKinlay (10.37) and Pippa Blackburn (11.16) in the girls first ever involvement in a road relay competition, so well done to them. Similar for the U13 Boys who were together for the first time with new member Thomas Stewart running 8.24 on Leg 1, Theo Addy (9.22) on Leg 2 and Magnus Taylor running the final Leg in 10.13 – the team placing 19th overall and 3rd in Lancashire. Our U15 Girls came home in 8th place overall and 2nd in Lancashire – led off by Millie Jordan who ran the 2nd fastest Leg of the day (7.49) backed up by team mates Charlotte Smith on Leg 2 (8.34) and Emily Wood on Leg 3 (9.55). Our U15 Boys were represented by Max Unthank who had an excellent run, running solo on Leg 1 and posting a time of 8.34. Max – a Burnley FC season ticket holder – gave up his ticket for the Burnley v Liverpool Match to run as well, so fabulous commitment from him.
L-R Pippa Blackburn – Sophie Douglas – Jenna McKinlay
L-R Millie Jordan – Charlotte Smith – Emily Wood
A cracking race took place in the U17 Men’s relay which saw the three teams finish 1st, 2nd and 4th in Lancashire team placings as well as 2nd, 5th and 13th overall. In the end, the North West title was won by Southport by nine seconds, but right up to around 400m to go, the two teams were neck and neck after Sam Aspey ran 15.05 on Leg 1, Max Winstanley in his first Road Relay for the Club ran 15.45 on Leg 2 and Henry Ward running 15.38 on the final Leg. Jack Wood (15.42), George Holman (16.40) and Theo Robinson (16.10) brought the B team home in 5th spot overall and 2nd in Lancashire whilst the C Team of Max Belshaw (16.45), Liam Bennison (18.14) and Loucas Lancashire (18.18) placed 13th overall and 4th in Lancashire. More Medals for the Harriers came in the U17 Women’s Relay where Lottie Hesketh (8.39) on Leg 1, Isabelle Perry (9.22) on Leg 2 and Agatha Taylor (8.52) on Leg 3, finished in 6th place overall and 2nd in Lancashire. Our B team had only two athletes with Emma Robertshaw posting a time of 8.51 on leg 1 and Bella McCredie (9.22) on the second Leg. In the Senior Women’s race Rebecca Ward led off on Leg 1 with 18.27 followed by Isabella Pacelli in 20.09 and Kiera Booth (22.30) for 29th spot overall and 5th in Lancashire whilst team mate Mary O’Gorman clocked 21.44 on Leg 1 in our second part team.
L- R Sam Aspey – Henry Ward – Max Winstanley
L-R Lottie Hesketh – Agatha Taylor – Isabelle Perry
Back Row L-R Emily Wood – Isabelle Perry – Lottie Hesketh – Millie Jordan – Emily Robertshaw – Agatha Taylor – Front Ron – L-R Bella McCredie – Charlotte Smith
Staying on the Road and on the same day – Sunday September 14th – there was a new PB for Blackburn Harriers Paul Bradshaw as he clocked 75.43 in the Cheshire Half-Maraton in 40th spot in a race won by Omar Ahmed in 63.39 from Joe Hudson oin 2nd (63.43) and Conor Sarsfield in 3rd (65.59). V35 Paul knocked off 1 minute and 14 seconds off his previous best time which he set in Barcelona in February this year (76.57). (Cheshire Results). Speaking to the Harriers after the race Paul told us that he was “Happy with the race. Course was undulating a little so took the flat and climbs steady and opened up on the downs. Pleasantly surprised with the PB“.
Paul Bradshaw
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On to a different surface entriely and this time on the Fells. Sunday 14th September saw the Bradley Fell Race take place, the latest in the BOFRA Series this year. V45 Louisa Powell-Smith who is having a successful season won this latest race in a time of 26.07 and was also the 1st V45 and 1st vet Woman on the day too – over 5 minutes in front of the 2nd place woman athlete. After the race, Louisa spoke to the club about how she was pleased with her race telling us that she “Absolutely loved it! A fast 3.5-mile out-and-back. I set off well and found a strong rhythm on the opening drag through the fields, then pushed hard to the top before turning for home. The downhill was quick and flowing. I opened my stride, kept the cadence high, and let the course come to me, finishing strong on the final downhill to the line. Happy with my run and enjoyed every minute!” (BRADLEY RESULTS)
Louisa Powell-Smith
In a similar vein, but quite a bit further, the bubbly and unquencable personality of Katie Buckingham – long time member of the Club – was out in all its glory at the weekend as she tackled a 50km race – running 50.57km with 1069m of elevation gain. Ninety eight runners finished the race – won by Tom Hall in 3hrs 39.02 with the winner of the Women’s race posting 5hrs 16.10 (Aisha Anwar). Katie had a fantastic run, taking 2nd spot in the Women’s race – 11th overall – just 29 seconds behind the winner as she posted a time of 5hrs 16.39. (BRIGHTON RESULTS).
Katie Buckingham – smiling as you do in a 50km race
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Track & Field isn’t quite finished yet as V60 and Throws Coach – Tony Balko – demonstrated at this years British Masters Championships in Derby over the weekend of 13/14th September. Tony was taking on the Shot Putt and Discus events in the Vet 60 age category and did well – despite the wind and rain – to come away with a medal in the Shot Putt – taking 3rd place and Bronze Medal with a best throw of 10.41m (SHOT PUTT RESULTS) – following that up with a 6th place in the Discus with a best distance of 37.02m. (DISCUS RESULTS)
L-R Tony Balko – Morris Fox – Gary Pullen
And what a good way to end the season for U15 James Acton-Grieves at the Combined Events competition held at Trafford on September 13th. Conditions could hardly have been described as the best but that didn’t deter James who has had an excellent season to date, setting new personal bests in the 100m (13.2); 300m (43.5); 400m (58.4); 80m Hurdles (13.3); High Jump (1.55m); Pole Vault (2.30m); Long Jump (5.14m) and Triple Jump (10.31m). At Trafford – James – up against 11 other multi-event athletes – finished in 2nd place overall with a combined total of 1988 points achieved by running a new PB in the 80m Hurdles (13.13), throwing another new PB of 6.98m in the Shot Putt, leapt out to 4.88m in the Long Jump; cleared 1.54m in the High Jump – just one cm shy of his best and clocked 2.30.65 in the 800m and his first ever attempt at the distance. (COMBINED EVENTS RESULTS)
Athletes at the traditional Blackpool Open Meeting on Saturday September 13th braved the wind and rain in completing their season, including quite a number of Blackburn Harriers young athletes. U13 Sophie Douglas took on three events placing 4th in the 70m Hurdles (16.3), ran 5.57.3 in the mixed age 1500m and finished the day with a new PB of 3.32m in the Long Jump. U11 Charlie Tuttle ran 12.7 in the 80m in Heat 1, U11 Harris Rawlinson clocked 12.9 in Heat 2 of the 80m whilst U11 Aidan Shannon ran a time of 14.7 in Heat 4. Moving on to the 100m where U13 Xuanqiao Llang clocked 13.5 in 2nd along with team mate U13 Noah Briscoe clocking 13.9 in 3rd (Heat 1) whilst in Heat 2, U13 Harry Mitchell placed 2nd in 14.4. U15 Tia Higgins ran the 100m in 14.8 whilst in the boys 100m races Kai Addison clocked 12.4 in 2nd (Heat 1) with team mate Ollie Haworth in 5th (13.7) as Callum McKone ran 15.2 in 3rd (Heat 2).
The 200m races had Abigail Awe, Alessia Rawcliffe and Rebecca Rowlings placed 4th, 5th & 6th with respective times of 29.8, 30.4 and 30.9 in the U15’s before Kai Addison took 2nd spot in the U15 Boys 200m clocking 25.8. Back in the 100m races and there was a win for Daniel Nuttall in the senior men’s / U17 race in 11.6 with U17 Jack Duxbury clocking 12.1 in 3rd. Evie Fort ran 29.3 in 3rd in the 200m followed by Rebecca Rowlings clocking 48.3 (5th ) in the 300m. Xuanqiao Llang ran 28.7 in winning the U13 Boys 200m with Harry Mitchell in 3rd spot (31.0) followed in Heat 2 by Noah Briscoe clocking 29.9 in 4th.
U11 Girls were out in the 600m – Scarlett Cothliff running 2.39.5 in 10th as Harry Holden clocked 2.06.4 in 4th (Heat 1) and Charlie Tuttle placing 5th and Harris Rawlinson 6th in Heat 2 – with times respectively of 2.08.3 and 2.08.4 which looked like a battle to the line. U11 Scarlett Cothliff took on the Long Jump too jumping 2.88 in 4th out of a pool of 14 whilst in the U11 Boys Long jump featuring 24 athletes, Harris Rawlinson, Charlie Tuttle and Harry Holden placed 12th, 13th and 18th with jumps of 2.93m, 2.94m and 2.75m. U13 Boys Noah Briscoe and Harry Mitchell came 2nd and 3rd in their Long Jump Pool of 13 with jumps of 4.37m and 4.03m alongside U15 Abigail Awe also placing 2nd in the Long Jump (4.26m) with team mate Alessia Rawcliffe (5th) with 3.43m – Callum McKone jumping 3.75m (3rd) in the U15 Boys event.
In Field events, Jenna McKinlay threw 4.38m in 2nd in the U13 Girls Shot Putt as U17 Rebecca Awe won her Shot Putt with a distance of 10.07m and then placed 3rd in the Discus with 22.73m, followed by U17 Loucas Lancashire throwing 39.83m in 2nd in the Javelin.
