School county success for Harriers juniors

Junior Harrier Holly Bulmer joined in the fun as she took on the Junior race completing in 18:31. Holly was joined by Dad Dave in the Senior Race (39:23) as well as Henry Brady (33:12) and Chris Lawrence (36:53).

Just a day later it was the Handsworth Hobble. A Summer edition of the Handsworth XC course brings its only challenges on the two laps of undulating woodland where the masses of mud are replaced by faster dry trails but with plenty of underfoot hazards. Henry Brady was first Harrier back in 16th, followed by Laura Sayce and Tanja Maric in 101 & 102 respectively.

By Wednesday it was time for the return of the Elmton Chase as the temperatures soared! A figure-8 undulating 5 mile loop around the roads and light trails of Elmton Village.

The Harriers provided 12 willing runners for the 2022 edition. It was the ladies taking the spoils this time though as first lady home for the Harriers was Kim Widdop in 38:09 with a prize for 1st in Age cat and 6th overall. Kim was joined by Sally Bulmer (42:31), Gemma Hind (44:12) and Alice Shaw-Phillips (44:56).

The men put in a good shift too as Matt Daly and Henry Brady cracked the top-10 in 7th (29:48) and 10th (31:47) with a superb run from recent recruit Phil Hare just missing out on a prize as second in age cat and 13th in 32:27.

The weekend was no less action packed as four juniors took part in the Midlands combined events regional qualifiers in Banbury. For Notts Schools, Freddie Marks competed in the Y8/9 after recently moving up bagging a long jump PB on the Saturday.

On the Sunday for Notts both Charlotte Ayton and Kitty Lawrence competed in the Y8/9 group. Excellent performances from both ladies saw Charlotte PB in sprint hurdles, long jump and 800 m to finish 8th overall, whilst Kitty also bagged a set of PB’s in shot put, long jump and hurdles to finish 13th overall.Highest finish for the junior Harriers however came from Alicia Wells competing for Derbyshire. PB’s of 1.53 m in the high jump, 9.42 m in the shot put and 27.8s in the 200 m on the Saturday before moving up to second part way through Sunday and a final PB in the 800 m in 2:35 saw Alicia finish second with a final points score of 3911; enough to see qualification for the English Schools Heptathlon Championship in September at Bedford.

A final success came in the form of the team prize as she was joined by her Derbyshire teammates to win the regional team title.

Still with some weekend T&F action but this time on the officiating side, Mark Hazlehurst as he leant a hand with the officiating side as an official at GB Champs in Manchester seeing some of the biggest name in UK athletics including Laura Muir it was a great day of some of the best competition around.

Going much longer on Saturday was Shaun Chadwick with the Lakeland 5 Passes Ultra starting in Grasmere in the Lake District. Taking in Loughrigg Fell, Wansfell Pike, Little Harter Fell, Harter Fell (Mardale), Thorthwaite Crag, St Raven’s Edge, Red Screes and finally Scandale Pass for an epic 3,000 m over the 50+ km Shaun completed the Ultra in a nice round 10:10:03 for a big day out!

It was also a double day of competition at the ever popular Round Sheffield Run. A 12 Stage race with runners running either single (Sex and age grouped), Male or Female Pair or a mixed pair as, there are plenty of categories to compete in with runners running approximately 18.5 km and 600m+ of elevation gain (covering 24.5 km in total) with stages everything from 400 m to a very challenging 2.5 km hill climb.

Tom McLaren set the fastest time of a Harrier of the weekend in 1:23:02, competing in the Male category along with Kerry Saville (1:38:57), Chris Lawrence (1:47:34) and Steve Hazlehurst (1:57:12). On the ladies front it was a very tight knit group as Samantha Marriott, Rachel Silcock and Tanja Maric completed in 1:53:17, 1:54:21 and 1:55:44 respectively with Joanne Campbell just behind in 2:04:10

On to the teams in the it was Matt Chappell first back with his partner in 1:26:40 (knocking nearly 20 minutes off their Winter RSR time!), followed by Matt Daly +1 in 1:28:51 with Steve Carr making his RSR debut with Bryan Cherry in an impressive 1:33:13, joined in a quartet with the quickest MIX Harrier of Charlotte Jones & Tom Shaw (1:34:05). Dominic Ayton rounded out the mixed pairs in 1:47:25. The mixed Pair category was the most popular this year as Henry Brady and Hannah Miller (1:37:40), Widdop’s (1:44:06), The Bulmer’s (with a very happy birthday! In 1:57:21), the Manley’s (2:02:56), The Shephard’s (2:09:54) and the Thorneloe’s (2:39:03) made for some great duo’s. We’re still not finished here though as the club completed the teams with two Female pairs of Pam Brooks and Cassie Worton ran 2:10:45 and Sarah Morgan & Kerry Dickinson ran 2:16:58

Finally Richard Hind was on the fells in the Kinder Trog fell race (Category BL) with nearly 1,000 m of ascent over the 16 miles. Run in very blustery conditions with 50mph winds on the tops made it very hard going, although visibility was excellent. The route consists of Lantern Pike, Mill Hill, Kinder downfall, Kinder Low, Edale Cross and back over South head, with Richard conquering the conditions and terrain in 3 hours 11 minutes.