Promising start to the season at the SAL and on the road

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Last weekend Thames Valley Harrier athletes were out competing at the Southern Athletics league and on the roads. Phil Wetton and Amber Simukonda report: 

SAL Division 1, Match 1, Peterborough, Saturday April 13th :

1. Nene Valley Harriers, 236
2. Harrow AC, 212
3. TVH, 193
4. Reading, 146

Due to the early start in April and Easter holidays there were a number of people missing for Saturday’s first Southern Athletics League match hosted by Nene Valley at Peterborough, but a good Valley team performance saw TVH finish 3rd in the match on 193 points.

A 16 strong Valley men’s team did a great job with nearly every man competing in more than one event to ensure that all events were covered bar the 110m hurdles, and Greg Bennett put in an excellent day’s work competing in the shot, hammer, discus, javelin and triple jump.

All this hard work by the men was rewarded with wins on the track for Abdi Mohamed in the A string 1500m in 4m09.6s and Oli Newton in the A string 2000m steeplechase in 6m22.2s, while there were wins in the field for Stan Vilga in the A string pole vault with 3.70m and Laurence Owen in the B string long jump with 6.05m.

There were also 2 pb’s on the day for Oluwole Orimoloye with 11.3s in the B string 100m and Oli Newton with 6m22.2s in the A string 2000m steeplechase.

The TVH Man of the Match award was won by Isaac Kitchen-Smith who scored maximum points in 3 events with wins in the A string 100m in 10.9s, A string 200m in 22.2s and final leg in the men’s 4x100m in a time of 42.6s.

On the women’s side we had a small team of 11 female athletes with 6 making their Southern League debut for the club-  Sheriffah Arewa, Ruth-Ann Otaruoh, Maryna Voloshyna, Nanci Sousa, Georgia Hanley and Madeeha Turay.  

It was a good solid start for our TVH ladies- what we lacked in numbers, we made up in team spirit with everyone doing multiple events so we could get those very much needed points. We had wins on the track from Hannah Hall (100 & 200m), Izzy Dye (1500m), Stephanie Ainley (2000 S/C), Fran Lou (2000 S/C B string) and on the field from Sheriffah Arewa (High Jump), Angela Barrett (Triple Jump).
 
The very snazzy TVH Woman of the Match award (and voucher) was won by Maryna Voloshyna who did the full complement of athletics events with the running (800, 3000 and 400m relay), jumping (high jump) and throwing (hammer and discus). 
 
Results can be found HERE
 
The next SAL match will be at Eton on Sunday May 19th and with a good turnout a good result can be produced! 

 

Road Races : 

There were some great results for TVH athletes on the road last weekend, with 4 Valley men all recording pb’s on the road.

In Sunday’s Brighton 10k Mohamud Aadan made a welcome return to competition after illness and injury to finish 9th in a high quality race in a swift time of 29m08s, to improve his 10k road pb by 50s.

Conor Kissane-Wood was also racing in Brighton and was in great form to finish 48th in a very good time of 31m31s, improving his 10k road pb by a minute.

Racing in the Paris Marathon on Sunday Jonathon Baird had a fantastic race to take nearly 5 minutes off his previous best marathon time to finish in 142nd place in a new pb time of 2h38m24s.

In Monday’s Boston Marathon John Borton made a long overdue improvement to his marathon pb by eclipsing his previous 2018 marathon time by over 17 minutes to finish in 221st place in a new pb time of 2h35m41s.

Brighton 10k, Sunday April 14th :
9. Mohamud Aadan, 29m08s, pb
48. Conor Kissane-Wood, 31m31s, pb

Paris Marathon, Sunday April 14th :
142. Jonathon Baird, 2h38m24s, pb

Boston Marathon, Monday April 15th :
221. John Borton, 2h35m41s pb