A hugely busy and successful last week for Blackburn Harriers and its athletes as they competed in multiple competitions covering individual and team events. We start with Olympian Holly Bradshaw who travelled to Germany for the Internationales Recklinghäuser Marktplatzspringen on Friday May 24th – her first competition of the season and her first since September 2023. Holly won the competition with a clearance of 4.50m at the start of her build up to the Olympics being held in Paris later this year. Holly (RESULTS), who is already an Olympic Bronze medallist, will be competing in her fourth consecutive Olympics which is testament to not only her longevity in the sport and the event, but to her tenacity, dedication, hard work and obvious talent combined with the psychological strength to deal with, and overcome injuries, highs and lows thast are inevitably part of the path that athletes travel in their career.
Holly’s performance in Germany ensured her selection in the GB team for the European T&F Championships being held in Rome between June 7th- 12th. Speaking to the BBC in an interview, she outlined where she is currently and her plans for this year which can be read in the link HERE
Holly winning in Germany – Photo courtesy of @friiedHelmkunze5
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One day later and Blackburn Harriers athletes were out competing at the BMC Grand Prix – World Athletics Challenger meeting held at Sportcity, resulting in some tremendous performances. (RESULTS). Dominic Walton kicked off the night by placing 2nd in the B 800m race with a time of 1.49.87, just eight hundreths away from winning it with his second best time of the season. Interesting that there wasn’t a single new personal best in the A and B races. Next up were the 1500m races with U20 Dexta Thompson, U23 David Holman, U20 Ben Stratton and U20 Isabel Holt in action. In the D race Dexta Thompson – starting the race with a best of 3.50.26 – kicked from some 350m out and took an excellent win in a new PB time of 3.46.99, two and half seconds in front of Henry Dover in 2nd. Next up was David Holman who had recently run 3.47.52 in the US and reduced that even further with a new PB clocking of 3.45. 34 in 3rd place in the C Race. Bottom of age U20 Ben Stratton was next to go over the 1500m – standing on the line with a personal best of 4.01.66. Another cracking run and a new PB by four seconds as Ben came in 2nd in a time of 3.57.44. Our last athlete in the 1500m was Isabel Holt who had recently run 4.40.8 in a Northern League West Premier Division match; And it was another new PB for Isabel as she came home in 2nd place clocking 4.34.95. Final race of the night for Blackburn Harriers athletes was the 5000m A race. Matt Ramsden went in this one – just one week after placing 2nd in the 10000m at Highgate with a 29.45.04 clocking and with a 5000m best time of 14.18.97. That was absolutely destroyed as Matt finished in 2nd place after a sprint finish with Sheffield Alfie Manthorpe – clocking a new PB by over half a minute of 13.48.12 – and fabulous end to the night for all of Blackburn Harriers athletes.
Ben Stratton (Green Shorts)
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The day after and it was the turn of the UKYDL Upper Age Group second round of this years matches in the Premier Division, hosted at Wavertree Athletics Stadium. Unfortunately, the match clashed with the Northern Inter-Counties T&F Championships being held the day after which meant that Blackburn Harriers had a massively reduced team competing on the day. The outcome was no surprise having a team so badly depleted, we finished in 6th place totaling 319 points, nevertheless, there was no shortage of effort and commitment by those athletes who were available on the day and some very good performances – including fourteen new personal bests.
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U20 Charlie Unsworth had a good day, first three in the 100m all crossing the line together and given the same time of 11.1 followed by Charlie clocking 21.8 in 2nd and again given the same time as the winner in the 200m. Charlie then anchored the U20 4 x 100m Relay team to a win in 44.4 – being joined by Charlie Palich, Daniel Nuttall and Samuel Mutombo. Samuel clocked 12.2 in the B100m as well as winning the Triple Jump with 11.58m and placing 5th in the Long Jump with a leap of 5.61m. Oliver Palk, like a number of athletes was taking on multiple events, clocking 52.2 in the A 400m (4th), coming 2nd in the B Long Jump with 5.29m and winning the Javelin with a distance of 41.08m. Codie Dewhurst weighed in to the team effort – taking on 5 events – including an excellently judged 800m race clocking 2.00.5 with a 62/58 second split (5th), clocked 63.5 in the A 400m Hurdles (3rd), cleared 1.60m in the High Jump in 3rd place, finished 4th in the A Shot Putt (5.74m) before being part of the U20 4 x 400m mixed relay team alongside team mates Oliver Palk, Keira Haxton and Isabelle Perry in 4th spot (4.00.1). By the time Jack Lamb came to do the 3000m, the day had turned very warm but that didn’t deter Jack from clocking a new PB by some 6 seconds as he came home in 3rd place (9.23.5).
Charlie Unsworth (1)
Codie Dewhurst
Oliver Palk
Isabelle Hartley and Kiera Booth took on the 100m running 15.0 (6th) and 15.5 (6th) repectively – Isabelle going on to run 30.8 in the A 200 (6th), throwing 6.86m in the Shot Putt (6th) and winning the B Javelin with 18.44m. Kiera ran in the A 400m Hurdles 6th in a time of 80.5 alongside team mate Millie Pilkington in the B race placing 4th (84.5). Keira Haxton took on three events running 64.3 in the A 400m (4th), clocking 2.34.3 (5th) in the 800m before going in the Mixed 4 x 400m relay team. Kady Thompson rowed into the team effort with a 2nd spt in the B Shot Putt (5.58m), 6th place in the A Discus with 17.29m and 4th in the A Javelin with a distance of 21.27m.
Millie Pilkington
Keira Haxton
Kady Thompson
Charlie Palich placed 2nd in the A U17 men’s 100m (11.7) then won the A 200m in 22.9 alongside team mate Daniel Nuttall who won the B 200m in 23.5 followed by a seasons best in the A Long Jump (3rd) with 5.85m. Matthew Haxton – middle distance being more his event – helped the team out running the B 100m in 13.4 (5th) before going on to clock a big new PB of 59.3 in 5th place in the A 400m. Henry Ward cut a chunk off his 800m best time with a new PB, placing 5th in 2.10.8. Also running a new 800m PB was Loucas Lancashire in the B race with his time of 2.23.1 (2nd) before going on to a new PB in the Discus with 2nd place in the B (21.38m) and 3rd in the Javelin A with another new PB of 35.86m – a hat-trick of new personal bests on the day. Harry Pilkington had a very good day placing 2nd in the A Shot Putt adding over a metre for a new PB of 9.13m, adding 5 metres to his Discus with a new PB throw of 30.23m in 2nd in the A and making it three new PB’s on the day with a 3rd place in the A throwing 26.77m. Felix Thompson added another new PB to the total of personal bests with his 2nd place in the B Javelin (20.09m).
Charlie Palich (A)
Harry Pilkington
Loucas Lancashire (AA)
U17’s Sienna Wareing and Zoe Green were the pairing in the 300m – Sienna running a new PB of 43.8 in 4th place in the A whilst team mate Zoe clocked 54.0 in 5th in the B before she went on to run 66.2 in the 300m Hurdles (5th). Sienna then added the Triple Jump and Long Jump to her events on the day – setting a new PB in the Triple Jump with 10.16m (3rd) and a third new PB in the Long Jump with 4.60m in 3rd – and another athlete who had set a hat-trick of new personal bests throughout the day. Tamzin Osborne cleared 2.85m in the Pole Vault to place 2nd and in the 80m Hurdles Alisha Lehner came 3rd with a time of 13.1. Another new PB, this time by Isabelle Perry in the 800m A race – her first year racing on the track – knocking well over 5 seconds off her best as she ran 2.36.7 in 6th.
Sienna Wareing
Tamzin Osborne
Alisha Lehner
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Just 24 hours later, and this time the Harriers were on the same bit of coast, this time in Blackpool as many of our athletes had been selected to compete for Lancashire in the Northern Inter-Counties T&F Championships which turned out to be a gloriously sunny day, despite all the gloom and doom weather forecasts. Ten Counties took part in the Championships with Lancashire fimnishing in 5th place overall, the winners being Yorkshire. Individual event results with athletes names are not available as we go to publish.
Team Manager Sarah Scott was delighted with the performance and told us “I am immensely proud of every single member of the 2024 Lancashire Team. We took the largest Lancashire team in years to the Championships, with many getting their first every Lancashire Vest. The atmosphere and support was amazing and we had the best village of all the Counties.To represent you County is a great honour and each and everyone of the athletes wore their vest with pride. An amazing and talented group – our future!
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Officials getting ready
Watching the action
Blackburn Harriers Max Belshaw & Logan McCredie
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Still on Track & Field – at Trafford on Grand Prix night, Tuesday May 28th. Ben Fish, Ben Makin, Daniel Smith and Charlotte Smith were out competing at this one, covering 3000m, 800m and 1500m. V40 Ben Fish was the first Blackburn Harrier to race on the night, in the 3000m A Race which had 22 runners in it. Ben came home with a seasons best time of 8.46.79 in 7th position overall – 8 seconds quicker than his first outing at the end of April. Next up in the 800m was Ben Makin who has already run races in the sub 1.54 bracket. This was another sub 1.54 clocking as Ben ran 1.53.64 in 8th spot – just half a second separating the places from 4th to 8th. Next to race was U20 Daniel Smith in the 1500m lining up with a personal best of 4.03.72 and looking to get close to the sub 4.00 minute time. He was so close to breaking through the 4 minute barrier, coming home in 2nd place with a new PB time of 4.00.52. U15 Charlotte Smith came home in 6th place in her 800m race, clocking a new PB by a second and a half with 2.27.32.
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The day prior – Bank Holiday Monday – Trafford held their regular Bank Holiday Medal Meeting on May 27th. U15 Jack Baranowski was one of 17 athletes in the 1500m race won by Southport’s William Delamere in 4.14.92 which places him 5th in the national rankings. Jack came 2nd in the race clocking 4.21.05. In the same race William Grundy ran his first track of the season, clocking 4.39.37 in 6th place. U11 Lucas Collins won his 75m Heat in 11.43 and made it a double as he also won his 150m Heat in a time of 23.12 and followed that up with a leap of 3.51m out of Pool of 17 Long Jumpers, placing 4th and topping off a very good day for the youngster. Team mate Max Unthank ran 21.91 in his 150m Heat (3rd) followed by a 2nd place out of 12 in the 1200m in a new PB time of 3.55.18. U15 Dana Juma won the Shot Putt with a throw of 8.65m.
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Sunday May 27th was the date for the holding of the British Masters Throws Pentathlon, at which, Blackburn Harriers V60 Tony Balko was competing – the Championships being hosted in Oxford at the Oxford City Athletic Club. Tony was competing in the M45 & 55-60 category finishing in 3rd place overall in the V60’s including throws of 38.10m in the Hammer (1st), 10.84m in the Shot Putt (2nd), 34.82 in the Discus (5th), 24.87m in the Javelin (4th) and 12.62m in the Weight (4th).
(RESULTS).
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On to the Road, and Manchester being the venue for the Great Manchester Half Marathon in which a number of Blackburn Harriers were running. V45 Vikki Robertshaw had a very good run on her debut over the distance finishing with a time of 1hr 33.22 with Senior Charlotte Atkinson running 1hr 32.58 for a new PB by just over a minute. V40 Sabrina Dewhurst, one of the volunteer Officials at the Harriers, made her debut over the distance, crossing the line in a good time of 1hr 43.29. On the same day the 10k race was also on which saw Senior Paul Bradshaw place 108th in 34.58 alongside team mates V40 James Bretherton coming home in 114th spot in a time of 35.12 and Senior Joe Bridge finishing in 118th with a time of 35.19. (RESULTS).
James Bretherton
