What a great performance from the 2023 British 10000m Champion Jess Warner-Judd on the opening night of the World T&F Championships In Budapest, contesting the 10000m against some of the best 10000m athletes in the world. With 800m to go Jess was in the pack, with 400m to go she was still in the pack as the race turned into a sprint finish over the last 300m – Tsegay taking the win in 31.27.18 from fellow Ethiopians Gidey in 2nd (31.28.16) and Taye 3rd (31.28.31). Jess battered it all the way to the line to finish in 8th spot clocking 31.35.12 – 8th in the world.

(The brilliant post race interview with Jess shared on FB via Athletics Weekly)

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Trafford was the venue for the final Match in this years Premier West Division of the Northern League – a Division which Blackburn Harriers have won for the last three years including winning the inaugural Grand Final in 2022. Unfortunately, this season has been one in which we haven’t been able to get full teams out which inevitably impacts on the results at the end of the day. A win in the home fixture at Witton Park made sure the Club maintained its place in the Premier Division and gives us the opportunity to come again in 2024 and challenge for the title and Grand Final. A massive thank you to all the athletes who competed throughout the year giving everything and to the officials who made sure we were fully represented at each fixture, fulfilling our responsibilities to the League. Congratulations to this years Winners Wirral.

(ALL PHOTOS ON BLACKBURN HARRIERS FACEBOOK PAGE)

This report starts at the end of the day with the 4 x 400m Relays – providing an exciting end to the Match. The Women’s team of Charlie Coy (63.45), Maddie Elliott (65.73), Isabel Holt (67.53) and Keira Haxton (64.90) came home in 2nd place in 4.21.62 with Sale distant winners in 4.01.56. The Men’s 4 x 400 team of Dominic Walton (49.93), Ben Makin (54.21), Matt Ramsden (52.12) and Daniel Bebbington (50.93) were involved in a great race with Trafford and Sale and were in the lead going into the last lap. The final leg saw Sale move away with 200m to go – winning in a time of 3.24.85, with Trafford in 2nd place (3.26.43) and Blackburn 3rd (3.27.19).

Back Row L-R: Daniel Bebbington – Dominic Bretherton – Matt Ramsden – Ben Makin

Front Row L-R: Maddie Elliott – Isabel Holt – Keira Haxton – Charlie Coy

Our Throws Squad did us proud once again. Anthony Kent won the Hammer (48.91m), placed 3rd in the Discus with 39.51m, 3rd in the Shot Putt with a distance of 11.70m and 6th in the Javelin (32.70m). Tony Balko (V55) who was entered into the Masters Throws Championships in Oxford the day after this Match still did all four men’s B throws placing 3rd in the Hammer with 28.56m, 6th in the Javelin (27.17m), 4th in the Dicus (26.45m) and 4th in the Shot Putt with 9.10m. Emma Harrison and Grace Bontoft paired up in the Women’s Hammer which saw Emma throw 40.14m in 2nd place in the A alongside team mate Grace throwing 31.88m to win the B. V50 Sarah Henton came back from an injury to take 3rd place in the Discus with 34.85m as Abi Brown also placed 3rd in the B with 26.06m. Grace and Abi teamed up in the Shot Putt, Grace placing 6th in the A with 8.14m and Abi 6th in the B with 6.71m. Millie Coy and Kady Thompson took on the Javelin with Millie who had already done Long Jump, Triple Jump and High Jump throwing 27.96m in 3rd place as Kady replicated that with 3rd in the B (22.23m).

Anthony Kent

Emma Harrison

Tony Balko

Sarah Henton

Abi Brown

Grace Bontoft

Millie Coy

Kady Thompson

In the Sprints which had a number of athletes missing, Samuel Mutombo and James Tierney stepped in to the 100m – Sam setting a new PB of 11.86m in the A race (6th) and James clocking 12.37 in 4th in the B. James then took on the 200m running 25.14 (6th) whilst Codie Dewhurst came and offered to fill the B slot even though he had done 400m Hurdles – (3rd in 63.98) – and 400m – (4th in 55.27) – prior and clocked a new PB of 25.75 in 5th spot in the B race. Charlie Coy stepped up for the 400m Hurdles – an event she hasn’t done for a long time – running 76.47 in 4th place. Amy Wiggans carried the load in the 100m with no B athlete as she ran 13.97 and then 28.70 in the 200m (6th). In the 400m it was great to see Charlie Coy running a new PB of 59. 79 in 2nd spot in the A race with team mate Keira Haxton in 3rd in the B (65.62). The Men’s 400m had Codie Dewhurst and Hayden Mercer producing good runs as Codie clocked 55.27 in 4th spot in the A alongside Hayden who placed 3rd in the B with 55.71 – Hayden earlier having cleared 2.90m in the Pole Vault for 3rd place with Codie taking on High Jump with a 1.50m clearance straight after running the 400m Hurdles.

James Tierney (11)

Codie Dewhurst (1)

Amy Wiggans (1)

Charlie Coy (1)

Hayden Mercer

Moving on to 800m races and above – Daniel Bebbington doubled up over 800m and 1500m winning the 800m A race comfortably in 1.53.92 with team mate Ben Makin winning the B race in 2.00.88. Daniel then paired up with Dominic Walton for the 1500m, resulting in a double win – Daniel taking the A race in 3.58.92 and Dominic the B race in 3.59.37. Matt Ramsden was our only 5000m runner and took another win in 15.45.58. Another athlete doubling up was Maddie Elliott in the 800m and 1500m – placing 3rd in the A 800m race with a time of 2.17.28 and 2nd in the 1500m A Race in 4.47.64. Keira Haxton doubled up in the 400m and 800m – winning the 800m B Race in a time of 2.25.91 whilst Isabel Holt ran the B 1500m race clocking 4.58.76 in 2nd place. Evie Taylor and Ellen Sagar-Hesketh added to the teams points total with two 2nd places in the Women’s 3000m – Evie 2nd in the A with 11.01.52 and Ellen 2nd in the B Race with 11.32.80.

Dominic Walton (11) – Daniel Bebbington (1)

Ben Makin (11)

Maddie Elliott (1) – Isabel Holt (11)

Evie Taylor (11) – Ellen Sagar-Hesketh (1)

Keira Haxton (11)

Matt Ramsden (1)

Samuel Mutombo and Kail Sturgess took on Long Jump and Triple Jump as did Millie Coy in the Women’s Long and Triple Jump events. In his first outing this season Kail leapt out to 5.80m for 3rd place in the A Long Jump with Samuel also placing 3rd in the B with 5.43m. Places were reversed in the Triple Jump as Samuel came 2nd with 11.96m and Kail 2nd in the B with 11.47m. Millie came 4th in the Long Jump with 4.85m and 5th in the Triple Jump with 9.24m.

Millie Coy

Samuel Mutombo

Kail Sturgess

Amy Wiggans

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Results Round Up

This weekend – August 19/20th – demonstrated real commitment to the cause by V55 Tony Balko. On Saturday he competed for Blackburn Harriers in the Northern League, throwing senior weights in Hammer, Discus, Shot and Javelin. Straight after he travelled down to Oxford to get ready for the Throws Pentathlon on the Sunday in which he won Bronze after doing five events – Hammer (37.06m), Shot Putt (10.61m), Discus (31.87m), Javelin (28.49m) and Wiright (12.90m), this time throwing with the weight for the age category. Commenting after the championship and the weekends overall events, Tony said that he “Really enjoyed the British Masters Athletics Throws Pentathlon Championships today in Oxford, performed better than I expected and came away with a Bronze Medal. Ordinarily, I’d be disappointed with a Bronze, but in context of how this years panned out, I’m pretty content with the result. It was a great showing from the Northern Masters Athletics Club (NMAC) team members, many of us were in throwing competition yesterday in various North of England Athletics League matches, before heading off down to Oxford to compete. Well done everyone, back-to-back competition is a real challenge. It was also great to catch up within many familiar and new faces from across the the UK and across all age groups, you are all a credit to Athletics. Finally, a massive thank you to Kay Reynolds, the organising team, officials and volunteers for a well organised, attended and enjoyable championships. That’s a season wrap for me. After a short break, it’ll be time to get this back sorted, get back into training and aim to get into great competitive shape for 2024. Watch out M60’s“.

Barrowford was the venue once again for the Podium New Balance 5k, Junior Races and Time Trial on Saturday August 19th. (ALL RESULTS) All the photos for this report are courtesy of David Belshaw who continues to supply an invalauable historical record of races in this area, for which we say a very big thank you. The Time Trial race with each athlete setting off at one minute intervals attracted some top runners which showed in the results. Joe Wigfield won the event in a time of 2.28.3 for the 1035m course with James Young in 2nd (2.30.8) and Tyler Bilyard in 3rd place (2.32.7). Alex Bell won the Women’s race withj a time of 2.42.5 from Erin Wallace in 2nd (2.49.5) and Calli Thackery in 3rd ( 2.57.5). Blackburn Harriers had three athletes in this – Ben Makin, having run the 800m and 4 x 400m for the Club in the Northern League that same afternoon had a fine run with a time of 2.46.4, Ben Walmsley ran 3.06.9 and Joe Bridge 3.07.6.

Ben Makin

Ben Walmsley

Joe Bridge

In the 5k Races, V50 Mark Almond – in his first actual race since 2019 – was one of 29 runners in Race 1 – running 20.14 in 15th spot and 2nd V50. Race 2 featured 57 runners which saw James Bretherton bagging himself a new PB by 5 seconds as he finished in the top ten (9th) in a time of 16.27 and first V40 finishing one second in front of the 2nd placed V40 Marc Sennett (16.28). V50 Nick Gaskell finished 2nd V50 and 29th overall with a time of 17.03 followed by team mate V55 David Almond in 47th position with a time of 17.57 and 2nd V55. Danny Maynard ran a new PB as he clocked 18.37 – an improvement of seven seconds in 53rd spot. For the Juniors there were three races U10 – U14 – U16. Liam Bennison ran in the U14 race placing 9th overall in a time 8.44.

Mark Almond (154)

James Bretherton (74)

Nick Gaskell (94)

David Almond (67)

Danny Maynard

Liam Bennison (220)

The City of Preston 10 mile road race was held on Sunday August 13th featuring one hundred and sixty eight runners – the race being won by Horwich athlete James Kevan in 53.38 from Luke Foley in 2nd (54.41) and Matthew Devlin in 3rd (55.20). Blackburn Harriers James Bretherton ran a very good new PB by close to two minutes with a time of 58.35 in 13th place overall and 2nd V40.

Ulverston was the location for a 10k road race featuring just over 200 runners on Wednesday 16th August – the race being won by Salford’s Mark Walsh in 31.55. (RESULTS). This was Peter Banks 5th 10k this year and he has won everyone of them in the V60 category – winning this latest one in a seasons best time of 39.04. The standard in the V60 national rankings is tremendous, Peter’s 39.04 showing him at 59th – the top 8 all sub 36 minutes.

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