Stratford Athletic Club members keep raising the bar

NEW personal bests were recorded by Stratford athletes competing in the John Love Memorial Open hosted by Rugby & Northampton AC.

Poor weather greeted the more than 20-strong Stratford AC cohort that took part in the event at the Moulton College Athletics Track, but this didn’t deter them from setting new PBs.

U17 runner Alex Adams, 15, competed in the 5,000m for the first time and recorded an impressive time of 16:22.1 to place him 15th in the UK rankings for an U20.

U13 athlete Alex Wood ran a new PB of 14.00s en route to winning his 100m heat and then recorded another PB in the 200m, clocking 29.3s.

Seb Hillard competed in two events, lowering his best time in the 100m from 14.26s to 13.4s, winning his heat in the process, before improving his PB in the long jump from 4.67m to 4.69m.

The club’s final 100m runner was U17 athlete Charlie Whorrod who clocked 11.8s

In the 200m, Harry Gravelsons was second in his heat with a PB of 24.1s. Annie Silvers knocked four seconds off her PB to win her race in 30.2s. She then set a PB of 2:40 in the 800m.

Stratford AC were well represented in the 800m with seven members competing. As well as Silvers, Niamh Hillard recorded a new PB, taking eight seconds off her previous best to clock 2:29.

Abbi Cooper destroyed her previous best by 18 seconds, finishing in 2:47.6.

Other 800m runners were Poppy Fox-Rowe (2:34), Caitlin Boyle (2:41.2), Arran Cooper (2:47.9) and Sam Plumb (2:40.6).

Fox-Rowe also ran in the 300m (46.2s) while Catherine Reynolds competed in the 300m (42.8s, PB) and 200m (26.3s).

In the 1,500m Olivia Robinson ran a time of 5:12 while Josh Harrison finished second in his heat in 6:02.9.

It was a busy day for brothers Benjamin (U11) and Ruben (U13) Fernandez. Benjamin competed in the 75m (11.7s), 600m (2:07.7) and long jump (3.51m) with all these results being new PBs.

Older brother Ruben competed in the 200m (35.8s), long jump (3.31m, PB) and javelin (11.77m).

The club had the top three places in the U17 and over javelin event. U20 Acelin Smith took first with 47.97m to place himself 25th in the UK rankings for his age group.

Josh Roberts came second with 45.57m which placed him 15th in the U17 age group rankings. Third place went to Holly Newton who threw 30.42m.

M65 Peter Coote was disappointed with his throw of 24.00m while Issy Newton threw 20.85m in the U17+ event.

In the U13/15 javelin pool Stratford had two of the top four throwers with Nikola Wodzisz (26.17m) and Alex McMillan (25.29m).

Finally, Boyle cleared 1.30m in the high jump.