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BAL Premiership Match Two

Missing a number of athletes, WGEL’s men’s team produced a solid performance to finish 4th in the 2nd BAL Premiership fixture of the season at Barnet Copthall Stadium on Saturday. Woodford scored 272 points, 7 ahead of Birchfield and 10 behind NEB, with Shaftesbury comfortable winners from Sale. Shaftesbury now lead the table with 15 points after two of the four fixtures, with Woodford 4th on 10.5 points, as just two league points cover places 2-5. In a good all round team performance with many athletes competing in more than one event, maybe Sam Watts “B” string 200m victory stood out.

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The weather at Copthall was extremely windy, and with the sole exception of the discus event was not remotely conducive to good Track and Field performances. The discus throwers did however make full use of the beneficial conditions as the winner Newham’s Abdul Bahari, having rushed back from the European Championships in Helsinki in search of Olympic selection, won with an Olympic “A” standard of 65.24, ahead of another Helsinki representative, Brett Morse. Woodford’s Tom Norman put together his best ever series but found that his 59.37m was only good enough to place 5th. In the “B” Chris Linque stepped in at short notice and his 47.09m was placed him 3rd.

 

The wind which helped the discus throwers, blew into the faces of the sprinters and against the 200m runners on the bend, and in this context Sam Watts win from lane 7 in the “B” 200m with 21.57 secs (-2.8) was a fine performance, and faster than the winning time in the “A” string, where Jordan Kirby-Polidore was 5th with 21.92 secs (-3.5). Sam had earlier finished 3rd= in the “B” 100m with 11.03 secs (-2.8), and later ran on both relay teams, contributing a notable 47.8 secs split in the longer event. In the “A” 100m, Simeon Williamson was 3rd with 10.67 secs (-1.8). Over 400m good points were gained, in the “A" Graham Hedman was 3rd , albeit in exactly the same time as the 2nd placed athlete with 47.37 secs, and in the ‘B’ Sylvester Juwe was also 3rd, with 47.77 secs. Both the 800m and 1500m events also contributed good points. In good quality fields, Jon Cook and Oli Heeks both placed 2nd. Jon, in the “A” with 1m51,74 secs, and Oli in the “B” with 1m54.09 secs, the same time as the winner. In the 1500m, a tactical affair in the wind, Tom Phillips was 3rd in the “A’ with 3m58.36 secs, and Alex Cornwell won the “B” with 3m58.70 secs. The 3000m was a harder run race despite the wind, and Ed Shepherd found his 8m30.72 secs only placed him 8th in the ‘A”, as Tom Beedell was 4th in the “B” with 8m54.39 secs. The steeplechase was run without a water jump, as the stadium staff were unable to properly fill it due to the low water pressure, apparently caused as a result of the source being shared with the constructors at Copthall which currently resembles the building site it is, with the work under way to share an (eventually) improved facility with Saracens Rugby Club. The event therefore suited the better flat runners rather than the steeplechase specialists, and Woodford’s pairing of Ryan McKinlay and Tomas Pilbersek both placed 4th. Ryan (despite taking a heavy fall) with 9m21.23 secs, and Tomas with 9m28.26 secs. Ryan had earlier endeavored to gain some other useful points, failing in the pole vault where he no-heighted, but succeeding in the 400mH where his 62.53 secs placed an unexpected 5th in the “B” event”. In the “A” Francis Smith was below his best and his 56.61 secs was 7th. In the absence of Richard Alleyene (at the European Championships in Helsinki) and an injured Dan Davis, Francis also stepped up to “A’ string action in the 110mH, placing 6th with 15.86 secs (-2.8), with Alasdair Strange, filling in for “B” string points, finishing 5th with 17.61 secs. Alasdair earlier in his specialist event the pole vault, struggled like many others with the wind, and placed 6th with 4.20m. Alasdair also gained useful points in the “B” long jump, 4th with 6.53m w (+3.3), and in the high jump with 1.80m for 7th. In the “B” high jump Healson Ihuoma was also 7th with the same height, 1.80m, having earlier finished 5th in the “A” long jump with 7.05m (+1.9). Woodford’s top hammer throwers were missing, Mark Dry in Helsinki, and Andy Frost, injured. This saw Peter Clarke step up to ‘A string action and he placed 6th with 53.70m, with Fergus Harford, 5th in the “B” with 34.59m. In the shot Devon Douglas was a good 5th in the “A” with 15.21m, and Chris Linque was 6th in the “B” with 12.29m. The javelin, also at times hampered by the wind, saw Stuart Harvey, 5th with 57.39m and Simon Bennett 3rd in the “B” with 56.31m.

The 4x100m team of Healson Ihuoma, Sam Watts, Omololu Abiodun and Simeon Williamson placed 3rd with 41.54 secs, a result that would have been better had Omololu not suffered cramp. This meant that the 4x400m squad had to be supplemented at the last moment by a 1500m man, Tom Phillips, but nevertheless still placed 3rd in 3m15.10 with Sylvester Juwe (49.0), Sam Watts (47.8), Tom Phillips (51.9) and Graham Hedman (46.5).

The 3rd BAL Premiership fixture is also at Copthall in 4 weeks on July 28th.

Full results here