Ross Millington ended his track season on a high note with an emphatic win in the innaugural UK School Games at the Scotstoun Stadium in Glasgow, an Olympic-taster meeting funded by a £1.5 million National Lottery grant.
Ross who heads this year's under-17 men's rankings with 3-50.01 was representing the North West of England team.
The race was a tactical run until the final 400 metres when Ross decided to speed things up after opening laps of 64 seconds he opened up a gap on the rest of the pack to come home a full four seconds clear of Midland's runner Chris Harvey and Ross Murray from the North East.
- Ross Millington 3.54.20
- Chris Harvey 3.58.19
- Ross Murray 3.59.72
- Millington sets the pace (Daily Telegraph)
Further afield Steve Vernon was running at the World Mountain Championships in Bursa Turkey. Steve finished 39th after developing a stitch at 8km when he was lying 11th at the time.
Steve will be hoping to do better at the European Cross Country trial in November.
Jess Coulson spent a week training at the GB Cross Country Camp for Juniors at St Mary's in London. The week long training camp was aimed at athletes who will be competing for team places at this year's European Cross Country Championships in Italy. She trained with Joe Pavey who advised on planning your season and peaking for championships.
Also at the camp was European bronze medallist Becky Lyne who was putting the final touches to her training for the last two track meets of the season, Becky spoke to the juniors on competition and foreward planning for major championships.
Becky finished 5th on Sunday in the IAAF World Athletics Final at Stuttgart and represents the European team at the World Cup Final in Athens next Saturday.
Birchwood 10K
Report: Phil McCann
Mixed fortunes for the ladies in the Birchwood 10k with the race supposedly being full and no entries on the day.
It came to light that it was taking some entries on the day and for those who were able to gain entry they again were again making in-roads in their performances.
The women's quality field was won in 33-30, a really fast time compared to our squads. First lady Harrier was Kerrie Wood coming home in 40-42 a little disappointing as she was hoping to run sub 39.
Next was Sharon Glendon continuing with her form after a good summer season to record a personal best in 43-20.
Vicky Barrett was using this as a little sharpener before her Marathon in Brussels next week took it steady to finish in 45-10.
Next was Debra McCann running a season's best for the distance 47-06, but just missing out on that sub-47 minute.
Finally Vicky Buckley after her lay off being on Holiday came back to record 49 min with Jane Nyland having to withdraw after 3k.
Also a little disappointing was Jenny Knass still recovering with her foot injury unable to take part but will be back hopefully in the next week.
Nothern League - final round
Report: Vicki Robinson
Helen Hudson leads the 1,500 metres with Carla Stansfield
Following the 4th and final round of the Northern League, the Harriers track and field team are now guaranteed promotion to division 2 for the 2007 season.
With many athletes away on holiday it was a weakened team that travelled to Warrington to contest the final match. However, we still managed to finish in 3rd place on the day, and were well clear in 2nd place overall, behind St Helens Sutton AC who will also be promoted to division 2 next year.
Carla Stansfield started off the track events with yet another excellent performance in the 400 hurdles, slicing a full 2 seconds from her best to record 70.4 seconds. Helen Hudson was also impressive in winning the B string 800 metre race in 2-24.4 minutes. Veteran Bashir Hussain was 2nd in the men’s 800 metres with 1-58.4 minutes, a time which ranks him 3rd in the UK for his age group. Bashir later scored maximum points by winning the 1500 metres.
Kelly Blackman continued her recent good form with a sprint double in the 100 and 200 metres, while Katie Deutsch was similarly successful in winning both B events. Vicki Robinson then went on to win the longer sprint in a season's best of 60.2 seconds.
15-year-old Jenny Bauer was making her first appearance for the team, and enjoyed a successful debut, placing second in the triple jump in a personal best of 9.60 metres. She also contested the 100 hurdles for the first time where she placed 4th in 20.8 seconds.
Another 15-year-old making his debut appearance for the club was Stephen Andrews who recorded 11.9 seconds when winning the non scoring 100 metre race. He was then recruited to run last leg of the 4 x 400 metre relay, a distance he had never previously contested. He was rewarded with the fastest split! and so looks to be one to watch for the future.
In the field Hayley Dugan contested a very close shot putt competition, where even though she threw a new personal best and club record of 10.31 metres, she tied with another athlete, but Hayley was awarded the victory as she had the 2nd furthest distance. Sam Riley was another winner in the field, taking maximum points in the javelin with 24.80 metres.
Finally, the ladies 4 x 400 metre team remained unbeaten in all of their 5 competitions this season, let’s hope they can continue this winning streak into division 2 next year!
Back-to-back wins for Kerrie
Report: Phil McCann
Kerrie Wood on her comeback trail after having her 3rd child ran back-to-back races and won both.
First was the Saddleworth 6 miler, a 2-lap course with Kerrie a clear winner in 38-54. Also in the field was Alice Dagg who was 9th lady and took the 4th open lady category in 44-49. Both ladies are building up for their Autumn marathons and are expecting to make big improvements.
The 2nd race for Kerrie the following day was the Radcliffe 5 mile trail race and again Kerrie came out on top recording a time of 33-04. Afterwards she said she was a little tired in her legs but it was good endurance training for her marathon.
Meanwhile on the same evening the final of the Sale Sizzlers 5k races was again sporting a quality ladies' field with Pauline Powell the clear winner in 16-55.
Unfortunately Jenny Knass was unable to compete due to a foot injury. Nether-the-less we had a lot of ladies from both mine and Maureen's squads competing.
First Stockport lady home was Samantha Thomas in 21-16 followed closely by Colette Morgan 21-53 and Karen McCrackle 22-15. All the ladies following were using each other as their benchmark and club rivalry with Maryte Moore 22-26, Debra McCann 22-45, Helen Todd 23-06, Jane Nyland 23-24, Ros Mann 23-32 Kath Ward 24-34, Jenny Day 26-30, Heather Cairns 27-34 all battling it together.
Jess takes AAA's title
Jess Coulson continued an excellent season with a win in the AAA's under-17 1500 metre championship final at Birmingham's Alexander Stadium last weekend. Jess finished over 6 seconds ahead of Marlborough's Rosy Cooper in 4-28.12.
In the under-17 boys' 1,500 metres Ross Millington suffered another narrow defeat to St. Helens' David Forrester, an incredible one hundredth of a second separating gold and silver.
Also at the championships Leah Kay ran an impressive 10-19.7 to finish 6th in the under-17 girls' 3,000 metre final.