Track & Field Report

12 June 2016

Samantha Griffiths won her first Midland title as Cheltenham Harriers athletes won eight medals at the Midland Championships in Nuneaton. After clocking 25.86s in her 200m heat, Griffiths took gold in the women’s 200m final with a new personal best of 25.52s. In the previous day’s 100m Griffiths came second in her heat with a wind assisted 12.32s and took bronze in the final with a wind assisted PB of 12.20s.

Mollie Courtney and Sophie Yorke continued their preparations for the England under 20 Championships next weekend by collecting gold and silver respectively in under 20 events. Courtney recorded her second fastest time ever over 100m hurdles winning a mixed Senior/U20 race in 13.44s – with a margin of over half a second over the second placed athlete. Courtney commented “It felt a much better run than last weekend and I am pleased to have run sub-13.5s again even though the wind gauge recorded 2.6m/s, so over the legal limit.” Yorke faced a much tougher task in the under 20 100m and missed out on gold by just 0.02s as she set a new Cheltenham Harriers under 20 and senior record of 11.75s. “I was disappointed not to win but it was a good race and it was my fastest time ever, although it will not count as a PB in the rankings as the wind was not legal”. Frankie Courtney collected bronze in the Senior Women’s 400m hurdles in a time of 68.05s. “I was hoping for a new PB as it dates back to 2011 but I haven’t hurdled for a couple of years through injury so I am just pleased to be back and seeing my times improving” said Courtney the elder.

The under 20 age group also brought Midland titles for Oliver Cornfield with 58.60m in the men’s javelin and for Mel Bird with 33.91m in the ladies discus. In the men’s 5000m Dan Owen set off cautiously and sat in sixth place for most of the race. Feeling good with five laps remaining the Gloucestershire Cross Country Champion upped the pace and moved into fifth place with three laps remaining, fourth with 800m to go and then up into third place with 450m remaining. A 31 second final 200m then saw Owen close within two seconds of the silver medal as he claimed bronze in 15:06.73. The men’s 1500m also saw Richard de-Camps earn a bronze medal with a 4:02.12 in a typical tactical championship race that started slowly and finished with a fast last lap. In the previous day’s 800m de-Camps took fourth in the 800m in 1:56.80 in which James Miller took sixth place in 2:00.81.

Meanwhile in the Hereford and Worcester County Schools Championships Alex Griffiths won gold in the under 17 boy’s hammer with a throw of 55.60, a distance easily in excess of the English Schools qualifying distance of 50m and just short of his personal best of 56.52m set at last month’s YDL meeting.