Veteran sprinter Trevor Hodgson powered his way to victory in the final of the Over 50 Men’s 60m, at the European Masters Indoor Championships, held in Torun in Poland on Wednesday 20 March.
The North East, and UK Champion, who prior to the competition was ranked No 1 in the UK, and No 4 in the World, as following finishing second in his opening heat on Monday in 7.50s, he went on to also finish second in his semi final in 7.54s.
He was beaten only in both of those events by Spaniard Xavi Bosch-Ortiz, who posted winning times of 7.49s, and 7.51s, respectively.
However, it was a totally different story in the final, where Ortiz could only get third in 7.49s for the Bronze medal.
Meanwhile, France’s Bouziane Belghorzi took Silver in 7.48s, whilst Hodgson saved his best for last, as he triumphed in an excellent 7.44s, his second-best time of the season for the distance.
Hodgson, who admitted more than an hour after his gold-medal success that he was struggling to take it all in, now looks forward to his upcoming summer season in his club’s colours having won three major titles, and of course those very shiny gold medals.
Hodgson’s winning performance was viewed at close quarters by his coach Dave Thomas, who also made the trip to Poland.

​After over three hours of racing, Morpeth’s Senior Men’s squad picked up a hard-won team Bronze in the Northern Athletics 12 Stage Relays, held at a breezy Wythenshaw Park in Manchester on Saturday afternoon.
 
With over fifty teams in a Senior Men’s race, which included strong squads from local teams across the North West as well as those who’d made journey over the Pennines from Yorkshire and the North East, it was always going to be a tall order for Morpeth to retain a title they took at Redcar last year, but the team can certainly hold their heads up after putting in an excellent showing that saw them within only thirty seconds of a Silver medal and a minute and twenty seconds off  Gold.
 
Once again Finn Brodie got the team off to a good start, tracking Team GB triathlete Jonny Brownlee, representing Bingley Harriers here, with Brodie recording 23 minutes 40 seconds for the 8 kilometre leg.
 
In his first team outing for Morpeth after transfer from Blyth, Josh Fiddaman showed his potential with 13:37 for the first short leg of 4.5k, with Connor Marshall taking the second long next to record 24:43.
 
Tom Prentice clocked 14:01 on leg 4 before passing on to Carl Avery, whose long leg of 23:10 was the club’s fastest time for the distance.
 
Ellis Hetherington, like Fiddaman in his first team outing for the club, clocked 13:46 on leg six, and with Alex Brown’s 23:55 for the day’s final long leg, the team were comfortably in a third place that they never looked like losing.
 
Morpeth’s remaining short legs were run by Tom Balsdon (14:07), a late Friday night addition, George Lowry (13:50), Alistair Douglas (14:14), Lawrence McCourt (13:25, the team’s fastest short leg) and Will Cork (13:31), for a net time of 3 hours 26 minutes 5 seconds, well over a minute ahead of Liverpool Harriers and AC in 4th (3:27:38).
 
Unsurprisingly, Leeds City were winners, clocking 3:24:46 with local outfit Salford Harriers and AC second in 3:25:35.
 
There was a decent team out from NE teams, with Gateshead just outside the top ten in 11th (3:44:14), Sunderland Harriers 18th (3:47:24) and Tyne Bridge also making the top twenty in 19th (3:47:48).
 
The Women’s Six stage was won by Sale Harriers in 1:57:12, only 11 seconds ahead of Leeds City in 2nd with Vale Royal a distant 3rd (2:00:26).
 
The only NE representation was by South Shields Harriers and AC, who to their credit turned out not just one but two teams, the A team making top twenty in 2:10:48 and a B 45th in 2:18:52.
 
 

With the track season fast approaching, the club is hosting its annual Try it/Trials night at the KEVI track on Monday 8 April. This is both to help prospective participants and team managers for the NEYDL team. Registration opens at 6pm and events will start around 6.30pm.
Coaches and parents are being encouraged to get as many of our younger members along to this event which will run until around 8pm. The programme will include sprints, throws, jumps and middle distance (800).
The club’s 11–17 year olds will again compete in the North East Youth Development League along with clubs from across the region.
The season begins on Sunday 21 April with a fixture at Jarrow.

Alnwick Trail Races
 
There were over 500 runners taking part in Sunday morning’s Alnwick Trail Races, organised by Wild Deer Events, with both half marathon and 10k races on offer over what the organisers themselves describe as ‘testing trail runs’.
Rob Balmbra recorded a remarkable four-minute winning margin in the half marathon, clocking 1 hour 22 minutes and 34 seconds ahead of second placed Hedley Fletcher (1:26:41).
Club colleagues Anna Wright and Jane Kirby both also had excellent runs, Wright 3rd overall and 2nd Over 40 in 1:44:16 behind local race winner Alnwick Harrier Elizabeth Joyce (1:37:37) and Kirby 62nd and 2nd O/50 in 1:54:18.
The 10k race was won by another Alnwick runner, Kieran Lowe, recording 38:28. Ian Armstrong, whose teenage son Harry had placed second in Saturday’s Druridge Bay parkrun in a new personal best of 18:38, was third overall and also first O/50 in 39:44. Club colleague Dave Stabler was one place behind in fourth but first O/45 in 41:44.

Brough Law Fell Race

The annual Brough Law Fell Race took place on the same morning over a five-mile route in the Ingram Valley that takes in a number of the area’s hillforts, with nearly 100 finishers.
Won by Northumberland Fell Runner Chris Larkin in 37 minutes 40 seconds, John Butters was 6th overall and 2nd O/40 in a time of 42:35.
Mike Winter was 26th in 48:55, Steve Haswell 28th in 49:31, Gary Mason 43rd in 53:08l, Lee Bennett 49th in 53:56.
Nicola Duggan was first female finisher in 47:39 with Morpeth’s Robyn Bennett fifth in 53:54 and Gwenda Cavill 14th in 61:34.

English Schools Cross Country Championships

Five athletes from Morpeth Harriers were on representative duties for Northumberland at the annual English Schools Cross Country Championships held at a windy Pontefract Racecourse on Saturday.
The overall result over the six events was disappointing from Northumberland’s point of view, with best performances being achieved by their Junior Boys and Senior Girls, who both finished as 18th in their respective events.
Three Morpeth Harriers took part in the Senior Boys event, where the Northumberland squad finished 25th, led home by Bertie Marr, who finished 73rd.
The other two Morpeth Harriers in the event were Elliot Kelso and Joseph Close, 81st and 149th respectively and second and third team counters.
Northumberland’s Intermediate Boys finished 26th, with Morpeth’s Ollie Tomlinson their fourth counter in 202nd place.
Having her first ever English Schools Cross Country outing, Morpeth’s youngest competitor Faye Heatley finished as fourth counter for Northumberland in the Junior Girls event in 254th place.

Podium Festival

Alex Brown, George Lowry and Tom Prentice all ran in 5k races at the Podium Festival at New College, Leicester, also on Saturday, with Alex recording 14:44, George 14:56 and Tom a big new pb of 15:16.
Also involved was James Young, who won the time-trial event, in which athletes ran a lap (approximately 980m) having set off in one-minute intervals. Times in the men’s race were particularly close, with the top five separated by three seconds, James recording 2:20.42.

10 Meeting

Perhaps the most remarkable performance of the weekend however was at the high-profile 10 Meeting in San Juan Capistrano, California on Saturday evening where, in a very competitive field, Rory Leonard ran a time of 28m 4.83s when finishing 10th overall in his heat of the 10,000m, a time that takes a remarkable 17 seconds off his previous best time for the distance. ​

Eleven Morpeth Harriers had the honour of representing the North East region when the annual Inter Counties Cross Country Championships took place at a relatively dry, sunny but breezy Wollaton Park in Nottingham on Saturday.
Although the recent postponement of the English National Cross Country in Staffordshire had cast doubts on the event taking place at all, with onsite parking the major issue, fortunately organisers managed to secure extra parking across the City to allow the ten-race programme to go ahead.
In the opening event for Under 20 Men, the North East team included four members of Morpeth Harriers who all made the scoring count, with the team finishing in sixth place out of 21 finishing outfits.
First to show for the region in the total field of 155 finishers was Morpeth Harrier Joe Dixon, who finished strongly in 18th place, with next home club colleague Will Devere-Owen, who finished 31st.
Bertie Marr was 39th with Ethan Phillips completing the region’s scoring quartet when in 61st place.
Best result for the North East however came in the day’s final Senior Men’s event, where Northern Champion Calum Johnson of Gateshead Harriers took victory and the individual Gold Medal, winning by seven seconds from Leicester and Rutland’s Tom Evans, with Scotland East’s Scott Stirling getting the Bronze.
It was also a team Gold for the North East Counties, with a win by 116 points over second placed Yorkshire, with a Northern Ireland Team finishing third, a further eight points adrift.
Morpeth provided two members of the winning six to count team, with regular pick Carl Avery 13th and debutant Will Johnson 60th.
The team count was made up by 10th placed Cameron Allan and 30th placed Chris Coulson, both of Houghton Harriers, with Adrian Bailes of Birtley 68th.
Just outside the scoring count was new Morpeth acquisition Ellis Hetherington, who finished ninety third in the day’s largest field of some 285 finishers.
Second largest field of the day was the Senior Women, where the North East were just pipped for a podium place, finishing fourth behind winners Surrey, with Yorkshire and Kent claiming second and third team placings, respectively.
Catriona MacDonald was the second counter of the six for the region, finishing in 44th place, with the region led home by North Shields Poly’s Charlotte Penfold in 26th.
Morpeth’s Millie Breese led the North East Under 20 Women home to tenth team place, when she finished in 28th.
Three Morpeth Harriers lined up in the Under 17 Men’s event, where the region finished in eleventh team place.
Elliot Kelso led the squad home when he finished in 32nd place, with Joseph Close and Ollie Tomlinson both receiving late call ups to the squad. Close was third team counter in 92nd place, and Tomlinson 137th.
The North East had an excellent individual result in the Under 13 Boys event, where North East and Northern Champion Thomas McCartie of Middlesbrough AC finished third, and gained a Bronze Individual medal, and led the region to fifth team place. Sadly Morpeth’s Ewan Line was unable to run, however.
There were podium places for the North East’s Under 13 Girls and Under 17 Women’s squads, who both secured Bronze medals.
The Under 13 Girls were led home by Birtley’s Olivia Murphy, who finished in twelfth place, with further team support coming from New Marske’s Gabriele Pinder (16th), Birtley club colleague Poppy Phillipson (36th), and Alnwick’s Emilia Waugh (54th).
Houghton’s Charlotte Dillon led the Under 17 Women home, when finishing eighth, with further team support coming courtesy of Darlington Harrier Zara Jones (16th), Blaydon Harrier Ellie Fellows (38th), and Gateshead Harrier Aoife Bell (41st).
The region's Under 15 Boys and Under 15 Girls squads finished in 13th and 17th places, respectively.