UKYDL – Lower Age Group Premier Division

The Track and Field season opened up in earnest yesterday in pretty appalling conditions at Sportscity in the first fixture of this years Premier Divsion West. Continuous rain, wind and cold made sure that the Pole Vault was held indoors. The conditions didn’t deter the athletes though and it was great to see such good perforamnces from athletes from all Clubs in these circumstances. In the provisional results, Sale have set down a marker for the Division by winning on the day with Preston in 2nd, Wirral in 3rd, Blackburn in 4th, West Cheshire 5th, Liverpool 6th and Stockport 7th.

The Harriers Lower Age Group Team was a lot different from the team that won Division 2 and Division 1 in successive seasons (2017 & 2018) as most of the top end U15’s had moved up to the Upper Age Group League this year. This and the step up in quality meant it was going to be a tough day for many of the athletes, some of whom were involved for the very first time. However, they still managed to produce seven wins, twelve 2nd and fourteen 3rd places on the day, which is great credit to them all and even though it isn’t unexpected for young athletes to produce lots of new personal bests, it was still good to see them wrack up a host of them on the day in those adverse weather conditions.

Standout performances came from Jayden Riley and Ben Boocock as Jayden clocked 11.7 in the U15 Boys 100m to win the ‘A’ with Ben running a new PB by four tenths of 13.1 to take 2nd spot in the ‘B’. Onto the 80m Hurdles and it was Ben winning the ‘A’ in 12.4 with Jayden taking the ‘B’ in 12.0, the 3rd time since April 13th that he has achieved the English Schools qualifying time in this event and currently lies in 6th place in the National Rankings with Ben in 9th position. Jayden then took on the 200m finishing in 2nd place with an excellent time of 23.7, a time that ranks him 6th Nationally at the current time. Samuel Mutombo ran his first ever competitive race and his first for the Club in the non-scoring race coming home 2nd (time to be confirmed).

  Jayden Riley (1)                                                     Ben Boocock (11)

  Ben Boocock (1)                                                     Jayden Riley (11)

Samuel Mutombo (1) – Stephen Alberts (11)

Zac Walmsley chopped over one and half seconds off his previous best to set a new PB of 41.8 in the 300m (5th) in the ‘A’ whilst Kyle Taylor-Pomfret cut two and a half seconds off his best time clocking a new PB of 43.0 (2nd) in the ‘B’. The ‘A’ 800m race saw Hayden Mercer batter his previous best time by four seconds for a new PB of 2.08.6 in 2nd spot after a great battle with Evan Savage of Sale for the win. Theo Watson is bottom of age U15 and showed great tenacity to hold on for 3rd place in a time of 2.24.0. Codie Dewhurst ran the non-scoring 800m and ran 2.35.9 (4th) with Stephen Alberts just one place behind in 5th, clocking 2.36.2 in only his second ever race over the distance. The U15 Boys saw Dexta Thompson take another sub 5 minute clocking with 4.56.5 in the ‘A’ with David Holman, having played a cup final before he arrived clocking 5.01.1 in the ‘B’ race.

  Zac Walmsley  (1)                                                  Kyle Taylor-Pomfret (11)

  Hayden Mercer (1)                                                 Theo Watson (11)

  Codie Dewhurst                                                      Stephen Alberts

  Dexta Thompson (11)                                             David Holman (1)

Rory Teare and Theo Watson teamed up in the Long Jump with Rory achieving 4.16m in 5th and Theo 3.96m in 4th in the ‘B’. Rory and Codie Dewhurst in the High Jump saw Rory clear 1.50m in 3rd whilst Codie set a new PB of 1.25 (5th) in the ‘B’. Rory and Hayden Mercer turned out in the Pole Vault for the first time ever and took two 2nd places in the ‘A’ and ‘B’ with Hayden clearing 2.10m and Rory 2.00m in the ‘B’ and after all that, Hayden went and threw 8.05m in his first ever attempt at the Shot Putt to place 5th.

Rory Teare

In the Discus, Kyle Taylor-Pomfret came 5th (15.72m) with Codie Dewhurst (4th) throwing 10.16m in the ‘B’ whilst in the Hammer Kyle added over two metres for a new PB of 27.85m (4th) with Sebastian Burton in his second ever competition throwing a new PB of 21.37m for 3rd spot in the ‘B’. Sebastian also took on the Javelin throwing 13.54m (3rd) with Dexta Thompson placing 5th in the ‘A’ (20.39m). In the two Relays events the U15 Boys 4 x 100m team came 4th with a time of 50.9 and in the 4 x 300m’s – 3rd with 2.56.7. The U15 Girls Relay teams placed 7th in the 4 x 100m (60.7) and 6th in the 4 x 300m (3.23.8) with the U13 Boys 5th in the 4 x 100m (61.5) and the U13 Girls 6th (59.6).

 

 

Kate Cookson started the day well for the U15 Girls cutting half a second off her 100m time to set a new PB of 14.0 (7th) with Eleanor Allsop clocking 15.0 in her first ever effort over the distance after which she was just a tenth outside her best, clocking 31.3 in the ‘A’ 200m (7th) with Keira Haxton setting a new PB by two seconds with her time of 30.5. There was a new PB for Leah Hoole in the 300m with her 46.0 clocking in the ‘A’ (4th) with Kate Cookson running 49.0 dead in the ‘B’ and yet another athlete running an event for the first time. Keira and Leah teamed up in the 800m with Leah in the ‘A’ (2.38.9) in 5th and Keira also 5th with a time of 2.42.0. In the non-scoring 800m Eleanor Allsop ran 2.49.0 and Molly Nicholls 2.57.3. The 1500m saw Abi Stratton mix it with the leaders clocking 5.10.4 in 4th place in the ‘A’ race with Hollie Cubbon taking 3rd in the ‘B’ with a time of 5.30.2.

  Kate Cookson (1)                                                   Eleanor Allsop (11)

  Leah Hoole (1)                                                       Kate Cookson (11)

  Leah Hoole (1)                                                       Keira Haxton (11)

Eleanor Allsop (1) and Molly Nicholls (11)

   Abi Stratton (1)                                                        Hollie Cubbon (11)

Well done to Leah Hoole who took on the Pole Vault for the very first time, clearing 1.80m for 3rd spot whilst in the Long Jump, Kate Cookson jumped a new PB of 3.85m (7th) with Molly Nicholls in her first ever attempt in the event jumping 3.65m in the ‘B’ – And Abigail Stratton taking on the High Jump at the last minute to help the team and clearing 1.15m. Nicky Saunders started off her UKYDL season in good style winning the ‘A’ Discus with a distance of 27.52m, followed by a 3rd spot in the ‘A’ Hammer (33.64m) and 2nd in the Javelin with 23.82m. In the ‘B’ Discus, Caroline Woodworth threw 15.59m in 6th place which was a new PB and took second spot in the ‘B’ Javelin with 21.92m – Grace Bontoft was 3rd in the ‘B’ Hammer (26.26m).

Kate Cookson

Molly Nicholls

Abigail Stratton

Nicky Saunders

Grace Bontoft

Caroline Woodworth

There was an exceptional performance from Ben Stratton in the U13 Boys 1500m. After a brilliant contest between him and the Sale athlete (Oscar Schofield) Ben took the honours with a 13 second new PB of 4.48.0 in the ‘A’ race which placed him at 7th in the National Rankings at the time, with Oliver Gill just one second outside his best time in the ‘B’ running 5.28.7 in 4th spot. Matthew Smith took 4th in the 800m ‘A’ with 2.34.2 as Ben Livesey clocked 2.35.9 to take 2nd place and valuable points for the team in the ‘B’. Ben equaled his PB in the ‘A’ 200m 29.1 in 5th with Oliver Gill setting a new PB by nearly in a second in the ‘B race with 32.1; And it was Ben Livesey again in the 100m running 14.9 (6th) and Harry Sambrook also 6th in the ‘B’ with 15.5 both of whom are more at home in endurance events – Harry running 2.42.5 in the non-scoring U13 800m.

  Ben Stratton (1)                                                      Oliver Gill (11)

  Matthew Smith (1)                                                  Ben Livesey (11)

  Ben Livesey (1)                                                       Oliver Gill (11)

  Ben Livesey                                                            Harry Sambrook

Daniel Smith ran a good race to finish 2nd in the U13 Boys 75m Hurdles in 14.5 and in the Jumps – Matthew Smith 3rd (1.35m) and Daniel Smith 2nd (1.25m) teamed up in the High Jump with Matthew going on to take 3rd spot in the Long Jump with a leap of 4.18m. Harry Sambrook and Toby Mansfield took on the Shot Putt which saw Harry place 7th (5.36m) and Toby 5th in the ‘B’ with 5.12m before going onto throw 18.10m in the Javelin in 5th place.

Daniel Smith

Matthew Smith

Amelia Burton and Lucy Rishton paired up in the U13 Girls 75m sprint with Amelia in 6th 11.4 and Lucy 7th (11.7) – Sophie Gibson ran 11.9 and Tilly Pollard 12.6 in the non-scoring race. Amelia and Tilly took on the 150m with Amelia in 6th (21.7) and Tilly 7th (24.9) in her first attempt at this race distance. Amelia earlier ran 14.0 for 2nd place in the 70m Hurdles.

Sophie Gibson (1)

  Amelia Burton                                                         Rilly Pollard

Eve Coulson took nearly 2 seconds off her 800m best time to clock a new PB of 2.52.2 (7th) with Kady Thompson in the ‘B’, running the race just to get points for the team in 3.23.6. Faith Gillibrand ran only her second ever track race for the Club as she took on the 1200m, running 4.38.3 in 7th. Niamh Gater and Lucy Rishton contested the Long Jump with Niamh reaching 3.75m (7th) and Lucy 3.34m in 7th also. Kady Thompson cleared 1.15m in the High Jump (=5th). Tilly Pollard and Madison Bontoft won valuable points for the team as Tilly threw 7.04m in the ‘A’ Shot Putt whilst Madison won the ‘B’ Shot (6.38m) – Madison going on to throw 13.97m for 5th spot in the Javelin and supported by Kady Thompson in the ‘B’ (3rd) with 11.44m.

  Eve Coulson (1)                                                     Kady Thompson (11)

London Marathon – Sunday April 28th

The London Marathon produced one of the finest performances seen over the distance that you are likely to see, as pre-race favourite Kipchoge, set a new course record of 2.02.37 to run the second fastest marathon time ever, the first being his too.

The Harriers had four representatives in the race – Chris Davies, Paul Guinan, Samantha McCreadie and Charlotte Atkinson.

Chris Davies was looking to make inroads into his personal best time, but the Marathon doesn’t always give you what you want as he told the Club after finishing “Today was a good time of 2:48. Anything under 3:00 hrs is a great achievement. That said it wasn’t what I was looking for and with all the good form I was taking into today I am slightly disappointed. Up to 21 miles everything was looking good but after the 22 mile mark I just simply tied up and was hanging on till the bitter end. It could happen to anyone. The plus side is I now know I can hit the required pace to get the PB that I want, I nearly pulled it off but I think now I have to address my actual marathon training. I train hard but I’m possibly guilty of overdoing it, especially on my long runs, they are to quick. It looks good on Strava on a Sunday dinnertime but I’m obviously not recovering properly. I can take positives from this, it wasn’t a disaster by any means but it gives me something to look at in the way of training. Well done to Paul Guinan, a great time after not doing a marathon for so long and well done to Sam McCreadie also. This hasn’t put me off marathons I look forward to the next one, whatever that may be”.

Chris Davies (Orange Cap)

Paul Guinan had not run a Marathon since 2011and now a V50 he ran a very good race to clock 3hr.01.25 and was a happy man as he told the Club “great to be back in London running the marathon, I forgot actually how hard it can be !! A gap of 7 years since my last, I ran the best I could and gave it a good go, the last few km were pretty tough, I survived !! Looking forward to a little rest now and hopefully have a great summer running for my brilliant club”.

Paul Guinan (24702)

Samantha Mc Creadie (Sam) has run just seven races in the last four years, having endured an horrendous time with injury after injury. Finally injury free – we hope!! – Sam managed to race a 10k, a half–marathon and a 20 miler as part of her preparation for her first ever attempt at the Marathon, and didn’t it go well as she explained to the Harriers when we caught up with her after the race First marathon and I didn’t know what to expect or how my body would cope with the distance. I wanted 3:59 so I’ll take 3:43:29! Maybe should’ve gone a bit quicker but both hips gave in at 19miles so every step of the last 7 was painful! Great atmosphere, great crowd and so well organised! Well done to Paul and Chris on fantastic times”.

Charlotte Atkinson was a member of Blackburn Harriers as a junior and moved away from the area to live in London after being at University. Recently she has decided to move back home to Lancashire and has rejoined the Club. She was doing her first ever Marathon which she was delighted with, clocking 4hr.03.30. Happy with her run and about returning to the Harriers, Charlotte told us Ever since I competed in the mini marathon when I was younger I’ve dreamed about running the London marathon and it did not disappoint. It was THE most amazing experience. I struggled through the last few miles but the crowd pulled me along. I can’t wait to return to the Harriers and get back to racing in blue and white!”.

Charlotte Atkinson

Mini-Marathon

The Virgin Money Giving Mini London Marathon is the official British Athletics three-mile road championships for young athletes aged between 11 and 17. If you’re looking for a challenge, the Virgin Money Giving Mini London Marathon is your chance to compete against the best new talent in British road running. The course is three miles long, stretching from London’s Old Billingsgate to The Mall. The event is open to entrants from the nine regions of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, and will include teams from all 33 London Boroughs.

Previous winners of the Mini London Marathon and Mini Wheelchair Marathon include four-time Olympic Games gold medallist Mo Farah, and competitors from the London 2012 Paralympics – silver medallist Shelly Woods and David Weir, winner of four Paralympic gold medals and a record seven London Marathons. There are also races for ambulant and para athletes.

In 2018 Matt Ramsden was selected to represent the North West in the Race and clocked a time of 15.52 – this year, Matt was selected again to run for the North West and this time had the honour of competing as the Captain of the North West Boys U17 Team and told us after running 15.20 in 43rd spot – some half a minute quicker than he had run the year before “I was happy with my race considering I got tripped up at the start but I was pleased to get back up and finish the race chasing the others”.

 

Three Peaks – Saturday April 27th

Race Report

Race History

Completing the circuit of Yorkshire’s Three Peaks is an achievement. Pitting yourself against some of the UK’s best fell runners and setting a record time in what may be winter conditions is an epic performance.

But athletes young and old, male and female, return year after year to challenge themselves on the Three Peaks Race over Pen-y-ghent, Whernside and Ingleborough. The first race in 1954 started in Chapel-le-Dale with six starters and three finishers. Fred Bagley, of Preston Harriers, won in 3hrs 48 mins.

The race record over the current course was set by Andy Peace, of Bingley Harriers, in 1996. His time of 2hrs 46mins 3secs remains unbeaten despite an international field in 2008 when the Race hosted the World Long Distance Mountain Running Challenge.

Another Bingley Harrier, Victoria Wilkinson, trained for months to knock five minutes off the women’s record set by Anna Pichrtova (Strakova), of the Czech Republic, in the World Long Distance event. Victoria cut it to 3hrs 9mins 19secs in 2017. She claimed a £500 bonus prize, which is on offer to male and female winners who set new records. Victoria finished 13th overall, the highest race position by a lady.

Race History

Race Video

RESULTS

This years race was won by Brennan Townshend in 2hr 50.22 with Ricky Lightfoot in 2nd (2hr 52.05 and Carl Bell in 3rd (2hr 55.44).

John Horrocks was running this race for the very frst time and was really looking forward to testing himself out finishing 125th out of the 670 finishers with a time of 3hr 55.39. Speaking to the Harriers after the Race John told us that it was his First go at the 3 peaks race. Fanstastic race and great support through out the course. Set myself a target time of 3:45 but started with a cold day before and given the conditions on the day I knew this would be difficult. Set off steady up Pen-y-Ghent and then picked it up to Ribblehead where I arrived a couple of minutes outside my target of 1 hr 30. The climb up Whernside is always difficult but I really struggled decending off Whernside and getting to Hill Inn checkpoint I thought I was done but no chance I’m getting on that bus!! The climb up Ingleborough I seemed to come to a bit and passed quite a few people to the top. The conditions at the top of Ingleborough where horrendous but it was all downhill from here. Again really struggled on the decent off Ingleborough and it felt like a long way back from the top. Finished 125th in 3 hrs 55. Happy with that for my first go. Thanks for everyone’s support and to people handing me food and drink on the course”.

John Horrocks

Matt Nuttall (V50) has a background of running this race over a number of years but hasn’t been able to race that much in recent times. However, his desire to get back to this race proved decisive as he clocked 4hr 01.11 to come home in 153rd position and told us post race that “Love this race , love the history, a few Blackburn Harriers legends have won it and it was good to see them on the day – weather was not a major problem to be fair”.

Matt Nuttall (77)

V40 Craig Greenough was the third runner for the Club and he came home in a time of 4hr 26.47 in 320th place.

Mid Cheshire 5k – Friday 26th April

This was a pretty fast race with the first 16 athletes all running sub 15 minutes – the winner Richard Allen running a time of 14.15 with Nigel Martin in 2nd (14.17) and Ed Shepherd 3rd (14.20). Another 50 athletes clocked sub 16 min times and their is little doubt that this is one of those races that produces fast times over the distance.

RESULTS

Two Blackburn Harriers ran this one, Tom Blaney being across the line first in a time of 16.11(78th) which cements a very consistent run of low 16 minute 5k runs for him. Calum Holmes was the second Harrier and he also had a fine run to equal his personal best time of 16.55 in 139th place.

Tom Blaney

Calum Holmes

Association of Colleges Sport National Cross Country Championships

at Wollaton Park – April 27th

Great venue to run cross country as four Blackburn Harriers – Tom Marchant, Joe Gebbie, Maddie Elliott and Freya Black had all been selected to run for the North West. Maddie placed 5th and Freya 25th as the North West Team Women’s won the Silver Medal whilst Tom came home in 7th and Joe 13th to give the North West Men’s Team the Bronze Medal.

L-R Tom Marchant – Joe Gebbie – Freya Black – Maddie Elliott

All Photos from Richard Marchant —— HERE

RESULTS – Not yet available.

Three Blackburn Harriers competed in the BATS Blackpool Aquathon race 2 in the North West Region Junior Series.

Saul Sharp came in 6th in the male swim 300m & 2.4k tun run time 10:44, William Grundy was 1st overall in the 150m swim & 1200m Run 5:13 and Lulu Sharp finished 16th girl in the 150m swim & 1200m 6:15.

L-R Saul Sharp – William Grundy – Lulu Sharp