 Mayor Alison Byard with Jim Alder and Hemant Desai An excellent club effort saw Morpeth Harriers Senior Men and Women’s Track and Field squad engineer a superb team victory in their third round Northern Athletics League match, held at KEVI on Sunday 10th July. The victory now sees them handily in second place in the North East Premier Division, with the final match being held at Middlesbrough Sports Village on Saturday 6th August.
They are two league points of leaders Gateshead Harriers; however, if they were to draw level on league points with them, Morpeth would currently edge ahead on the basis of their cumulative match points. To have any chance of league victory, realistically Morpeth would need to definitely win that final match, and their Tyneside rivals would need to finish third or lower. Mouth-watering thoughts for sure, however, there is a great deal of work to be done before these factors would become remotely possible. Team Managers Tom Innes, Mark Snowball, George Patterson (Men), and Vina Desai (Women) will no doubt feel encouraged by all of this, and even a minor placing would give them a feeling of job well done in their first season as joint administrators. Last Sunday’s match support, on a hot Sunny Day, was boosted by the presence of three times elected Mayor Alison Byard, who commented afterwards on her own Facebook page that she was greatly encouraged by what she witnessed, and that the Morpeth winning performance crowned her day, praising the club for continuing to support the community sporting efforts in the highest way possible. On to the performance itself, and the club’s Men worked very had to secure points from both Track and Field. There were three double victories in the Men’s Track performances, which came courtesy of Alistair Douglass and Daniel Melling in the 800m, Joseph Anderson and James Tilley in the 1500m, and Adam Pratt and Mark Snowball in the 3000m Steeplechase. Douglass’s winning time of 1m57.4s, was a season’s best, as was Daniel Melling’s B Race winning time of 2m03.5s. Anderson’s win in the A Race of the 1500m in 4m07.9s was a mere second outside his personal best, however Tilley’s B race win in 4m18.5s, was a new personal best. Pratt’s A Race win in the 3000m Steeplechase, where he looked to the manor born, in 10m21.9s was a season’s best, and Snowball took the B Race in 11m00.6s. Connor Marshall battled well with Gateshead’s Luca Minale throughout most of the twelve and a half gruelling laps of the 5000m but could only finish second in the end in 15m41.5s; still was a new personal best, while a bonus came when a resurgent Richard Johnson took the B Race, producing new figures of 15m55.9s. In a hotly contested 400m A Race, Alistair Douglass very nearly had another victory, just being outpaced by Gateshead’s Justin Cooper. Douglass produced a finishing time of 52.9s, which was a season’s best. Under 17 athlete Liam Roche, did well for third in the B Race, producing a personal best time of 56.4s into the bargain. The Male sprints of 100m and 200m for Morpeth were shared by Under 20 athlete Evan Logan and newcomer Anthony Liddle, previously with Claremont. In a strongly run 100m A Race, Logan finished fourth, producing a new personal best time of 11.3s. He then finished third in the 200m A Race, just a fraction adrift of his personal best with 23.6s. Meanwhile Liddle finished fourth in both the 100m B Race in 13.2s, and 200m B Race in 27.4s, both of these events being tackled for the first time. The willing Liddle also tackled the 400m Hurdles for the first time, finishing fourth in the A Race in 73.9s, and Mark Snowball finished third in the B Race, posting a season’s best of 73.3s. Morpeth throws specialist Hayden Richards c provided the club with its best points tally from the Field. He won the Hammer event with a best throw of 35.38m, which was a personal best. He finished second in his preferred event, the Javelin, producing a best of 40.52m, where it took a personal best throw by Wallsend/Blyth’s Matthew Fairhurst of 43.50m, to stop him winning. Hayden also finished fourth in the Discus A competition, where he produced 24.67m, which was a season’s best. In the respective B competitions, Richards performances were supported by John Butters (Hammer) 10.18m, which made him third, and in the Javelin, Thomas Innes finished third with 21.17m, both athletes showing the willingness to muck in that has helped characterise the squad this year. Dave Marshall finished fourth in the Discus B competition with 16.72m, all of the above personal best performances. Morpeth finished second in both the 4 x 100m and 4 x 400m Relays, in respective times of 46.6s, and 3m48.4s to strong Gateshead squads. It was very promising to see Sean O’Hara, Kenny Harrison, and Over 55 Veteran Trevor Hodgson back in action in the Relays. Nisha Desai, Caitlin Flanagan, and Charlotte Earl, all enjoyed individual A String victories in the Women’s events, and there were B String wins also for Julie Vermaas, Kay Errington, and again Nisha Desai. The extremely hard-working Nisha Desai – who took part in an extraordinary seven events - produced a fine victory in the 400m A Race, posting a time of 58.0s, which was a season’s best, and Under 20 athlete Mia Belton finished second in the B Race in 65.0s. Nisha also won the 400m Hurdles in 60.8s, which gave Morpeth a double victory, as Kay Errington took the B Race in 79.5s, these were both season’s best performances. In the 100m Hurdles, Nisha finished second in 16.5s. Under 17 athlete Caitlin Flanagan had a superb victory in the Women’s 1500m, taking the three- and three-quarter lap event by the scruff of the neck at around halfway, to record a seven second margin victory over second placed Claire McManus of North Shields. She posted a winning time of 5m15.9s, while Tayla Murdy finished third in the B Race in 5m53.4s. Tayla appeared again in the 800m, where she ran 2:53.8 in 5 th , with Sarah Routledge coming in 3 rd in 3:11.09 in the B. Lindsay Quinn was also 3rd in the 3000m in 12:06.9, with Julie Vermaas winning the B race in 12:188, the two having worked together well for much of the race. In the 100m, Mia Belton finished second in the A race in 12.9s, and Laura Kincaid finished fourth in the B Race in 14.4s. The 200m saw Under 17 athlete Victoria Hodgson finish fourth in the A Race in 27.4s, while Kincaid finished third in the B Race in 30.4s. Staying with the Morpeth Women’s Track performances, they also won the 4 x 400m Relay in 4m27.7s, courtesy of Caitlin Flanagan, Tayla Murdy, Nisha Desai, and Mia Belton. The 4 x 100m squad finished second in 58.1s. On to the Women’s Field Events, where Charlotte Earl - who had competed at the English Schools Track and Field Championships less than 24 hours earlier, but whose commitment exempliflies the new spirit in the camp - won the Triple Jump A competition with her best effort of 11.09m, and this very quickly turned into a Morpeth double win, with Nisha Desai taking the B event with 10.68m. This pairing also saw success in the Long Jump, where Nisha just missed out for victory in the A String to New Marske Harrier Molly Thrower by one centimetre, with her best effort of 4.92m. Meanwhile Earl won the B String with 4.82m. In the throw’s events, Morpeth’s Claire Reid finished second in the A String Shot Putt (9.87m), second in the Discus A String (29.22m), and third in the Hammer (25.00m). Respective B String support came from Vina Desai fourth in the Shot Putt (4.80m), Julie Vermaas fourth in the Discus (12.30m), and again Vina, second in the Hammer (14.54m). Somehow, Vina found time, in addition to organising the Women’s team, to officiate also and even fitted in a chat with the well-impressed Mayor. MATCH RESULT 1 st Morpeth Harriers 351pts, 2 nd North Shields Poly 319pts, 3 rd Gateshead Harriers 304pts, 4 th Wallsend/Blyth 269pts, 5 th New Marske Harriers 257pts, 6 th Middlesbrough (Mandale) 9pts. …………………………………………………………………. Mongolian International Serod Batochir, who is still registered with Morpeth Harriers in the UK and a life member, currently holding the club’s Marathon Record of 2hrs 08mins 50secs, set in Japan in 2014, showed remarkably that he can still hold good form, as he finished 26 th in Sunday’s World Championship Men’s Marathon in Eugene, Oregon, having at one point led the race in the early stages. Batochir posted a time of 2hrs 11mins 9secs, which was almost equal to his London Marathon time achieved in 2011. Comments are closed.
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