The return of the Tuesday night Trafford Grand Prix meetings kicked off on a windy night at Longford Park on April 28th with athletes alll looking to see how their winter training had gone. Blackburn Harriers had a number of athletes out during the evening, covering 3000m, 800m and 1500m. Ninety three athletes contested four Heats of the 3000m with the first Heat including Daniel Bebbington and Joe Monk in a race which saw the first and second athletes home break 8 minutes – Biruk Kebede (7.59.72) and Arlo Ludewick (7.59.79). Daniel took 4th spot with a time of 8.21.53 which presages a good start to the track and field season whilst team mate Joe crossed the finish line in 6th spot setting a new PB of 8.23.50. Heat 2 had U18’s Jack Wood and Gordon Ballantyne in the race and both ran new personal bests – Jack finishing in 9th spot with a new PB of 8.59.87, a massive improvement of over half a minute, whilst Gordon came home in 19th spot also running a new PB of 9.12.75 which was a big 8 second improvement on his previous best time. Jack Wood has, in his last four races, set new personal best times for 800m (2.07.2), 1500m (4.12.4), 3000m (8.59.87) and 5k (15.40) – some start to the season.
Daniel Bebbington (67) – Joe Monk (170)
Gordon Ballantyne (113) – Jack Wood (114)
First up in the 800m was Ibraheem Kantharia who hadn’t raced since August 2025 havinghad to deal with an injury. Ibraheem’s personal best was 2.01.37 and he just missed out clocking 2.01.49, which on a windy night and his first race back showed promise for the season ahead. U18 Max Winstanley was next up and he kept the personal bests coming as he came home in 4th place clocking a new PB of 1.59.32, his first time under two minutes and an improvement of a second and a half. U20 Ethan Cutler ran in the next Heat and took charge, leading from the front, easing behind with 200m to go and then kicking off the bend to win the race in a new PB of 1.59.90, a massive improvement of six and half seconds. The new personal bests kept coming as U18 Matthew Haxton in Heat 5, lining up with a personal best of 2.06.80 clocked another new PB time of 2.05.89 in 3rd place with a very good finish up the home straight. U20 Holly Moffatt and Ben Clarke ran in the final two Heats of the 800m – Holly clocking 2.23.84 in Heat 7 and Ben running a new PB time of 2.25.62 which was just his second race on the track and an improvement of tweleve seconds from his first attempt just a couple of weeks ago.
Ibraheem Kantharia (133)
Max Winstanley (218)
Ethan Cutler (90)
Matthew Haxton (209)
Holly Moffatt
Ben Clarke (30)
The 1500m races came next which had U18 Sam Aspey in Heat 2 standing on the start line wityh a personal best of 4.03.56 which he brought down with the 8th new PB of the night, clocking 4.02.69 in 7th place. U18’s Isabelle Perry and Agatha Taylor were the final Harriers athletes competing on the night both of them running really well – Isabelle placing 4th in a massive new PB of 4.59.92, alongside team mate Agatha in 6th spot clocking 5.01.33, just two seconds outside her personal best.
Sam Aspey (281)
Agatha Taylor (6) – Isabelle Perry (140)
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Over in America Blackburn Harriers Hammer thrower Matthew Heywood was out competing again in the Conference Championships in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina over 23rd – 25th April. Matthew was just outside his personal best in taking 2nd place with a throw of 54.49m and told us about the Championships after his event, commenting “in the conference championship this weekend I didn’t do as well as I would have liked but still threw 54.49 and had a big miss into the sector unfortunately; finished in 2nd but that throw would have been 1st. My team however performed outstandingly and we managed to lift the trophy so are conference champions“.
Matthew Heywood (Left)
