Nine teams of TVH Young Athletes swept round by enthusiastic supporters at the NWL YAL
The Valley had athletes in all the races and were helped round by the enthusiastic parents and supporters.
Starting with the Under 11 girls race we only had Anna Kelly who had a fine run to finish eighth out of 23 runners. Underfoot it was very muddy in places but there were nine teams competing.
Also in the under 11 boys race we were also short of a team. After an eight hour drive home from Northumberland and arriving at 2.0 am Reginald Rock did very well to finish third. Behind him Wilf Howard-Vyse had a great time in only his second race to finish eighth out of 38.
The under 13 girls were helped to third place by Skye Bishop running in this race after arriving too late for the under 11 event. Olivia Sparks had a great run to finish fourth and Skye showed just how good she is by finishing ninth just in front of Zenia Gordon who was naturally annoyed with herself at losing out to Skye.
With the Valley supporters at fever pitch the under 13 boys were swept round by their enthusiasm and all performed well. Alfie Turner was our first home in fifth place and was always up with the leading group. Morris Rock didn’t go to sleep after his long journey. In fact he had a splendid run to finish eighth. Charlie Rollo also back from holiday finished 10th, well up in a field of 32.
Both our under 15s teams won their races. The girls were very pleased with their achievement of having three girls in the first six. Niamh Murphy was second and just held off Maddie Casey by three seconds. Melina Duer was a bit wary after breathing problems the previous week but ran sensibly for 6th place.
After a back injury at Brighton, Abdikafi Abdi was back in action. He had a tough race for the lead but finally finished a good second beating a Harrow boy on the line. Although Basil Rock finished a minute behind the winner he still had a good race to finish eighth. After a talk with his Team Manager, Baqar Abamecha started the race determined to do well. He was chased by clubmate Nelson Gordon the whole race only to lose out by four seconds over the last 400m. They were 12th and 13th. The team were first and may win the league title on March 3rd at Wormwood Scrubs.
With one runner in both the under 17’s races it was an impressive win by Amelia Casey by 30 seconds in the Ladies race. Nicholas Duer decided to run at the last minute and was glad he did and was pleased to finish third in the Men’s race.
U11 Girls 1200m. Team 8th.
8 A Kelly 6:22.
Under 11 Boys 2000m. Team 5th.
3 R Rock 8:41; 8 W Howard-Vyse 9:09.
Under 13 Girls 2000m. Team 3rd.
4 O Sparks 8:52; 9 S Bishop 9:13; 10 Z Gordon 9:15.
Under 13 Boys 3000m. Team 3rd.
5 A Turner 12:11; 8 M Rock 12:35; 10 C Rollo 12:43.
Under 15 Girls 3000m. Team 1st.
2 N Murphy 13:21; 3 M Casey 13:24; 6 M Duer 13:49.
Under 15 Boys 4000m. Team 1st.
2 A Abdi 14:56; 6 B Rock 15:41; 12 N Gordon 16:24; 13 B Abamecha 16:28.
Under 17 Women 4000m. Team 3rd.
1 A Casey 17:22.
Under 17 Men 4700m. Team 4th
3 N Duer 18:33.