SAL fixture 5 and season's review
WGEL finished second in their third successive SAL home fixture to provisionally end the season 8th out of 22 in division 3N. BAL rivals Newham and Essex Beagles managed to bring out more of their top tier athletes and also the strongest women's team overall to take the match. Woodford finished comfortably clear of Loughton and Braintree, with Ilford and West Norfolk well adrift.
Steph Howe highlighted with a PB in the hammer, 46.62, to take female athlete of the match. The men's event was an even higher standard. Harry Clarke edged out brother Peter, but having won every match between them so far this year the pair were well adrift of the NEB pair of Thomas Head (62.69) and Alex Warner who enjoyed throwing on their regular training circle and both exceeded the division record. Devon Douglas tussled with old rival Matthew Baptiste, winning the DT but losing out in the SP while Hugh Williams took the B string in each. James Bongart did not face the quality of opposition seen in the other throws, but was challenged by a period of gale force winds which also led to cancellation of the womens HJ.
Eike Vardja (throwing the javelin, above) was once again the top points scorer for the team, taking her tally to over 100 for the season, the second year running she has provided more points than any other athlete. She was edged out only by teammate Katie Petyt in the TJ, which the U17 won in her first SAL competition. Phoebe Fuhr defied the weather to win the PV (photo right), while the other winner in the jumps was Christman Ihuoma in the TJ (13.53).
Woodford had a strong showing in the short sprints, led by Omolulu Abiodun in the 100m (10.8). Savion Williams had an all-conditions PB of 11.3 in winning the B string, matched by Stefan Redmond in the NS. U17 Jos Farquharson won his first SAL A string in the 200. In her second race post the birth of her daughter, now veteran Katie Skelding won in 26.2, with U17 Rebecca Fafowora matching her best of 26.5 in winning the B. Larrisa Anipa matched her best winning the B 100 in 13.5. Unsurprisingly our 4x100m teams also prevailed. Vee Joshi came in as a last minute replacement on the anchor leg and held on to the lead provided by Joey O’Neill, Stefan Redmond and Jos Farquharson. The women’s team of Larrisa Anipa, Rebecca Fafowora, Precious Ajayi and Katie Skelding was more dominant, with their time of 51.1 the fastest in division 3N this season.
After a solid season including competitive outings in all of our BAL matches, Paul Scanlan had anticipated an easy 800 race ahead of a rare outing over 1500. These expectations were adjusted when he realised he was racing a regular NEB rival, but then it became clear he was also facing 1:46 athlete James Shane, who was notionally a B string on his comeback race. Satisfied with 2nd against the former British 1500m Champion, Paul finished impressively to win a tactical 1500m before returning to anchor the victorious 4x400m team after solid legs from Greg Gilbert, Olaoluwa Abiodun (photo left) and Vee Joshi. Our other distance winner was Zoe Watson in the 1500m, her first A string victory in this league.
Across the season the team has performed solidly in a division where promotion was made much harder by clubs entering from the now defunct southern mens and southern womens leagues. The club finished sufficiently high to avoid losing out if the increased number of clubs leads to a further change in the league structure. The SAL has proved that it offers an opportunity for appropriate competition for a wide range of abilities. Across the season WGEL members won 8 out of a potential 10 athletes of the match and 5 athletes of the division (including Lucy Marshall 3 times, capped off by a division record). More importantly over 70 athletes competed for the club, with an age range of almost 50 years. The team manager would like to thank all those who competed, officiated and otherwise facilitated in this campaign.