ATHLETICS (ROAD RACES)
This last week saw both the start of the mota-vation road race series at Charlton-on-Otmoor and the county road-relay championships at Abingdon.
The mota-vation race on Thursday attracted a field of over three hundred with a large number from the three Banbury based clubs.
The race was won by Highgate Harrier Dave Bruce in a time of 20minutes 59 seconds. Tim Wright of Banbury Harriers showed that he will figure prominently in the series again when finishing fourth in 21minutes 33seconds.
Hook Norton Harrier Dave Tame also produced a solid run to finish in 15th place. Darren Nichol led the Cherwell Runners team home in 64th place and other good runs in the male section came also from the three local clubs with Andy Morris of Hook Norton in 93rd place and The Banbury Harrier vet 60 Bruce Hendrie in 101st place.
In the ladies section Jude Craft of Headington finished in 38th place overall with a time of 24minutes 45seconds. It was good to see Banbury Harriers Connie McMillan back into competitive running after almost a year on the sidelines. Her solid produced a finishing place of 74th. Also Fay Barrington ran well for Cherwell in 97th place.
The road relays at Abingdon on Sunday produced two good medal winning performances in the junior section from Banbury Harriers.
In the girls race Tia Williams set them off to a good start and she came into the takeover contending first place. This was continued by Flora Ayres on the second leg, she handed over to Emily Thompson on the final leg. Oxford City challenged hard on this leg but Thompson was determined to collect first place, which she duly managed.
The junior boys race also produced a battle, Gregor Kelling finished the first leg in front and Will Thompson did likewise on the second leg. On the third leg Luke Sherlock had to contend with the the highly talented Carl Facey of Abingdon and despite producing the second fastest leg of the race he had to give best to Facey.
In the senior races despite the odd good individual legs from the Banbury clubs they finished well out of medal contention.
Mike.
Ok maybe the seniors didn’t win any medals but it was a good day out, a bit of fun and everyone put in a lot of effort for the club. A special thanks to Geoff for coming back from Cambridge just to run.
Lisa & Rebecca both ran very well to back up Ros, who was 15th overall and 1st V45, to give the ladies vets a very good 6th place out of 16 teams.
It was decided to sacrifice the mens team for the vets squad which was probably the right move considering the lack of seniors we had. However Tom Offord was not put off and had a great run to finish 7th man on the day. (guessing Tom’s & Glyn's times should be swapped over on the results).
Phil
