Track and Field Round-Up July 11th
WGwEL Men’s “B” team was in Southern Men’s League action at Ilford, placing 4th in a very close contest. There was also news form the BMC Grand Prix in Solihull, the Welsh U/20 Championships in Carmarthen, and the Aviva British Grand Prix from Gateshead.
With the Men’s “B” team suffering towards the bottom of the First Division of the SML, a stronger performance in this penultimate fixture of the season was imperative in the fight to stay up. In the end Woodford placed a frustrating 4th with 107 points just 6 points behind the winners, Met Police AC. Boosted by the inclusion of recent former international decathletes, James Wright and Lee Okoroafo, and one from several years back, and now a veteran, Paul Howard, the team made a great effort to cover almost all the events. Despite numerous winners, and many other fine performances, missing competitors in just a couple of events made the difference between finishing 4th and a comfortable victory.Full SML results here
Saturday evening saw the latest BMC Grand Prix held at Solihull. In warm but breezy conditions there was as usual a fine depth of standard at the meeting. Tara Bird gradually improving her form as she gets back into racing following several months of missed training due to injury, recorded a season’s best over 800m of 2m04.92 secs in placing 6th in the women’s “A” race. With thanks to Athleticos, video here.
In the men’s “B” 800m race, Oli Heeks was 8th with 1m50.65 secs, video here, and in the “G” race, Andrew Mariani was also 8th, in 1m57.47 secs, video hereThe ‘A” 5000m saw a return to the track for Matt Gunby, who has been recently more focused on triathlons, and he placed 8th with 14m29.38 secs, video here
Ben Phillips picked up a bronze medal, missing silver by just 0.01 secs as he placed 3rd over 400mH with a personal best of 56.64 secs at the Welsh U/20 Championships in Carmarthen. Junior Ejehu, still an under 20, was given the chance to race in the heats of the 100m at the Diamond League meeting in Gateshead, in a race won by Tyson Gay, Junior recorded 10.83 sesc (-1.6).