Valley youngsters show good form at Harrow

Posted on 7 February 2016 |

The North West London race at Harrow, although fairly flat was its usual muddy event at this time of year. Most of the TVH runners were well prepared with tape round their shoes to keep them on. In the under 11 girls race Lily Dafter followed up her good Southern under 13 performance with her best result of the season when she finished fourth. Also running well, Mabel Salkeld had a good run to finish 18^th out of 32. In the boys under 11 race Alfie Turner was outwitted by a Shaftesbury boy who opened up a gap at the halfway point and although Alfie chased him he was beaten by five seconds. Also in that race, Charlie Rollo was a good 15th, Otto Huber just beat Ben Moon as they came in 25^th and 26^th.

Roy Clarridge reports:

Ava White won the under 13 girls race by a large margin although she was sick after her efforts to stay with the under 11 boys leaders. Again Melina Duer had her best result of the season to finish second. Also having a better run on a flat course, Lily Salkeld was pleased with her sixth place. The big surprise was the performance of Charlotte Cooney-Quinn who earlier in the day had run 5000m in the Hounslow mini-marathon trials. She appeared to be full of running at the end and was well satisfied with her 10^th place. Our lone under 13 boy, Aidan Ferrand also did well to finish 10^th.

Under 15 Amelia Casey was having her first run in TVH colours and fought well to finish third. Another newcomer, Noushka Summerfield, was also having her first race and sensibly, started steadily and improved throughout the race to have five runners behind her despite running in training shoes. Oliver Weintraub had a great run to finish second in the under 15 boys race and it was good to see Nicholas Duer move through the field to finish fifth. Alice Harray almost pulled it off in the U17 race. Knowing that the leading girl didn’t have a fast finish, she gave chase and was just one second behind at the finish, hard luck!

NW London YA League, Harrow, 6^th February 2016, results:

Under 11 Girls. 1200m. Team 7^th.
4 L Dafter 6:44; 18 M Salkeld 7:43.

Under 11 Boys 2000m. Team 3^rd.
2 A Turner 9:13; 15 C Rollo 9:59; 25 O Huber 10:25; 26 B Moon10:26.

Under 13 Girls 2000m. Team 1^st.
1 A White 9:12; 2 M Duer 9:38; 6 L Salkeld 10:03; 10 C Cooney-Quinn 10:42..

Under 15 Girls. 3000m. Team 4^th.
3 A Casey 14:53; 13 N Summerfield 16:56.

Under 15 Boys. 4000m. Team 3^rd.
2 O Weintraub 16:50; 5 N Duer 17:35.

Under 17 Women. 4000m.
2 A Harray 18:29.