VITALITY LONDON 10K
STRONG SHOWING FROM KENT AC AT VITALITY LONDON 10K
Kent AC were out in force at this year’s Vitality London10K. Last year we did well in the event and this year the plan was to do even better. It seems though we weren’t alone in targeting the race. Incorporated within the race is a team championship for clubs. Last year Aldershot won and this year it again looks as though they took the honours. Although the official result hasn’t been declared, at the time of writing it appears as though Highgate were second with us in third spot. Our scoring team was an impressive one. John Gilbert came home in sixteenth in the high quality field, while just fifteen seconds behind was James Connor. By the looks of it there was a battle to claim the third scoring place with just a second separating Jordan Weaver and Chris Greenwood. Following on from our scoring three, there were a number of other fine performances. Very close to running under 32 minutes was Neil Phillips .Our next man home was Joe Hartley, just getting the better of James Bowler. Joe’s someone who’s made remarkable progress in a very short space of time. Now training with the ‘A’ group it looks as though sub 32 may be a realistic target in the not too distant future. Whilst he doesn’t appear to feature in the initial results, I’m reliably informed Gareth Anderson came home in 33:57. In the battle of the ‘B’ group Stuart Beaney earned the bragging rights with a three second advantage over Che Compton who had such a good London marathon back in April. Also running for our men were Daniel Rees and V60 Eric Glover.
There was a good turnout of Kent AC women in the event – with a number of PB’s being run. Over the last couple of years Amy Clements has logged a considerable number of miles in revising her marathon PB and of course last year earning bronze medal in the world 50K championships. So prior to this race Amy had taken a well earned break and had only recently resumed serious training. Nevertheless, she still ran under 36 minutes in the race. Although she’s coming back from injury Teresa Murphy managed to run comfortably inside 40 minutes, while Alison Thomson , again coming back from injury ran a time not far off 40 minutes. Perhaps, though, the run of the day for the women was from Nicky Hayes. Nicky is in the V55 category and ran 43: 18 – 7 minute miles all the way. The results indicate that Nicky was second in her category and I my guess is that this time would place her pretty high up in the national rankings. Revising their PB’s by some margin were Abby Clyndes and Annabelle Hadlow.
MORE RECENT NEWS
Highgate Night of 10,000 PB’s, 20th May 2017 + Sutcliffe Park, BMC Meeting, May 24th 2017 + Alex Yee runs European Junior 5k qualifying time.
There were some fine individual runs from Kent athletes at the now hugely successful Highgate Harriers organised meeting. Now in it’s fifth year the organisers put on a series of graded races over 10k that give runners a great opportunity for improving their PB’s What’s more there is a tremendous atmosphere at the Parliament Hill track with packed crowds in the outside lanes, music and beer tents to get spectators in the mood. In the first race the day, Lawrence Avery displayed a blistering sprint finish to win the race and in so doing took a chunk off his PB. He broke 32 minutes for the first time. Lawrence had always been in a good position in the race, but there was still a considerable gap he had to make up on the young Taunton runner who had always headed the field after the pace maker had dropped out. Lawrence’s stealthy finish was such that the race commentator didn’t see him coming! Also running solidly in the race were Jonathan Tipper recording (33:21) and Stuart Beaney (34:38).
In the men’s ‘B’ race John Gilbert finished twelfth in a field of 26. John’s time of 30:34 was highly creditable in the light of him having a very disrupted winter season. For the first part of the race only one runner went with the pace maker and so typically it was John who towed the rest of the field round in an attempt to get them back on terms. And talk of the pace maker – it was our very own Alex Yee. With his fluent style Alex looked incredibly comfortable as he took them beyond half way. I am sure I wasn’t alone in thinking that if he’d have been in the ‘A’ race he would have beaten most of the runners. Something perhaps born out by the latest news received from Alex’s father. At a high class meeting in Belgium on May 27 Alex ran a superb 13:37.6. The best time by a UK under 20 runner for a good many years and over 40 seconds within the qualifying time for the upcoming European Junior Championships ( A further post will follow on this news)
On May 24th at Cambridge Harriers home track we had a number of runners in the last race of the evening – the 5000 meters race. Second in the race was Neil Phillips. Neil was just outside 15 minutes and so not too far off his PB. Fifth in the race was Lawrence Avery 15:15, recording another PB just a few days after his victory in his race at Highgate. Pete Lighting, (15:40) ran a PB, and Rob Laing ran and a seasons best.