Junior Harriers help county to second place in Sportshall event

The team also comprised of athletes from Blyth, Morpeth and Tynedale Harriers who took on strong opposition from Durham, Tyne and Wear and North Yorkshire.

The athletes are required to participate in a range of indoor events with emphasis on competing as a team and encouraging the individuals to partake in a range of different track and field events.

The Alnwick Juniors bonded together well with the athletes from the other clubs and formed an excellent team.

In the final placing Northumberland managed to rank second place in virtually all the age categories which was an excellent result against such strong competition.

* Three Alnwick Harrier Juniors travelled to Prestwold Hall, Leicestershire also on Saturday to represent Northumberland in the Schools (Y7) National Cross Country Championship.

Hannah Johnston, Lauren Brown (both Lindisfarne Middle) and Max Murray John (Glendale) made the 200 mile journey with the rest of the team and had an excellent day.

The girls raced first and Lauren was first home for Northumberland in an excellent 21st position, whilst Hannah was less than a minute behind and finished 97th out of over 150 runners.

Max ran next and managed an excellent 72nd place with the Northumberland boys finishing as third placed team. The Juniors had a very long bus journey but managed to secure some excellent results to end a successful cross country season.

* Three Alnwick Harrier Juniors travelled to Norwich to represent Northumberland in the English Schools Cross Country Championship. Ben Kelly and Dan Fletcher both ran for the Senior Boys and Rebecca Reed ran for the Senior Girls. All ran well and the county managed good mid table results in the overall championship.

* The North Eastern Counties Athletic Association held their annual indoor Pentathlon last weekend. Alnwick Harriers fielded three athletes in the event all of whom were attending their first major competition of the year.

Finlay Telfer (U13) had an excellent competition managing personal best performances in all his events. Finlays time of 13.53s in the 60m hurdles gave him a good start, finishing as 2nd north east athlete. Finlay maintained this position after the shot putt by throwing 6.12m, followed by an excellent high jump of 1.21m.

Going into the long jump he had a 10 point lead over the 3rd placed competitor from Blyth but his jump of 3.37m wasn’t enough to maintain this and he slipped into 3rd. In the 60m sprint, the final event, Finlay had to manage his best to hang onto the third place medal. Fortunately he managed an excellent run and scored enough points to maintain his place and win the bronze medal in the north east championship.

Antje Hall (U15) ran a good time in the 60m hurdles finishing in 11 .81s which was faster than her recent personal best only a couple of weeks ago. In the long jump Antje fell just 1cm short of her new pb that she set only last Thursday.

The high jump, a new event for Antje, almost ended in disaster after three unsuccessful practice jumps. However, Antje recovered and entered the competition at the minimum 1.0m height and after a shaky start quickly developed her confidence to finally clear 1.09m. A good result as failure in any event effectively ends your competition chances. Personal bests in the shot putt and 60m (9.00s) sprint finished Antje’s day off well in her first Pentathlon competition.

Ollie Telfer (U15) also had a good day with several personal best performances. His hurdling, high jump of 1.42m and long jump of 4.37m placed him well but a disappointing shot putt meant he had to run under 8.5s for the 60m to hold his 3rd place position. Unfortunately after a long tough day Ollie couldn’t manage this and finally finished 4th in the north east Championship.