The Easy Runner Blog

THE final month of the track and field season saw many of our athletes call it a day for the summer – particularly after the finial Midland League matches son Sunday August 1st - and taking a well-earned holiday.
But there was still a hard core who persevered and were rewarded with some notable performances and the occasional personal best.
That has produced an interesting short list for August which will give our judges pause for thought as they decide who should win the pair of training shoes from Easy Runner, Bristol’s leading athletics retailer in St Michael’s Hill.

JAKOB WHITE: The 16-year-old made his debut for Yate & District AC in their final Midland League meeting by winning the 400m B race in 52.4secs. He also won the B shot (11.81m). The following week finished runner-up in the South West Inter Counties (52.20secs) and then came third in the 100m with a PB of 11.59secs at the Team Bath Open meeting. White ended a busy month by representing the South West at the International Antwerp Gala finishing fourth in the 200m in a windy 23.84secs.

HAYLEY GREEN: The 19-year-old Bristol & West AC hammer thrower achieved a second best ever throw with 42.59m at the McCain Throws Fest in London. Was also third in the Dennett Trophy at Yeovil with 42.31m and the Cwmbran Open meeting (38.02). Also won the discus at Yeovil (34.06m) and finished second at Cwbran with 34.58m, her second best effort of the summer.

MAX CRESSWELL: The 16-year-old javelin ace threw 45.29m for the senior event in Bristol & West’s final Midland League match at Nottingham and was fifth in the shot (8.36m).

ISABEL HATCH: In her first full season the 14-year-old Bristol & West athlete from Wick won silver medal in the Under 15s pole vault at the England Championships with 2.90m. Hatch was also third in the South West Inter Counties Championships and won the Team Bath Open, in both matches clearing 3.00m, just 10cms off her PB which puts her second in the UK Under 15 Rankings.

JOSH BAGNALL: In his final race of the season on the final day of August the 18-year-old Bristol & West AC runner clocked a personal best of 1:57.7 to win the 800m A race at the British Milers’ Club meeting at the Exeter Arena,

EVIE TANNER: The 16-year-old turned out for the first time this season for Bristol & West AC’s final Midland League match clocking 16.9 for fourth place in the 100m hurdles and then competing in the event for the first time finished second equal in the high jump with 1.35m. Also ran in the club’s victorious sprint relay team.

THE Westbury Harriers’ pair of John Terry and Debbie Marsden raced to victory in the Channel Islands over the weekend.
Marsden won the Alderney 10k road race clocking 38mins 30secs over a very tough course while Terry won the half marathon in 1:21.25.Both times are new course records.
“It was hilly, windy and hot but also a beautiful island,” said Marsden, who was below par following a recent virus.

LISTEN out for Emma D’Alton on BBC Radio Bristol today as she is being interviewed over the problems the organisers had with the ChampionChip timing devices used in yesterday’s Bristol half marathon.
The Westbury Harrier lost hers out on the course – apparently 900 of the other 11,000 finishers suffered the same fate – and initially feared she wouldn’t appear in the official results.
Fortunately that matter was quickly resolved and D’Alton was confirmed as 12th woman in a time of 1hr 18mins 38secs, a personal best by
It also meant D’Alton was second local woman after overall winner Claire Hallissey but as the Bristol & West AC woman also picked up the top prize of £1,000 plus £750 for being first Brit then D’Alton should get the £100 prize as first runner with a BS code.

MATT Ellis’ personal best time of 1:10.42 will lift him from 38th to 13th in the South West Rankings for the half marathon.
The time smashed his previous bests of 74:11 that he ran to finish second in the Gloucester half marathon in July and to further underline just how much the Westbury Harrier has improved his PB last year was 78:42 in Exeter’s Great West Run.
Ellis has also set PBs for 5k (16:08 in the Bridge inn), 5 miles (27:31, Weston Prom) and 10k (33:57, Ivybridge).
The 32-year-old might not keep improving at that rate but if he can get a solid winter of training then he should be ready to come out next spring and break the 70 minutes barrier.

CLAIRE Hallissey’s secret in combating jet-lag? Drinks loads of coffee and tea!
Watching her win the Bristol half yesterday just 72 hours after landing in the UK following a transatlantic flight from Washington DC you would never think she had undergone such an arduous journey.
“I seemed to get over jet-lag quite quickly but I have to admit on Friday morning I felt shocking” said Hallissey.
“I was drinking bucket-loads of coffee and tea and that kept me going!”

IN-FORM west runner Laura Parker won the women’s race in the Bristol road miles on Saturday.
With her confidence sky-high after picking up £750 for winning the 3000m steeplechase in a personal best at the McCain UKA Challenge final at Cardiff the previous week Parker quickly took up the pace and while she never looked like being threatened Hannah Alderson, in her first outing in a Bristol & West vest, never gave up the chase and there was only a second between the pair at the finish.
The Welsh were over in force for the men’s race and there was a Cardiff AC clean sweep for Chris Discombe, Ieuan Thomas and Michael Johnson.
Top local finisher was Bristol & West AC’s Martin Flook from Gregg Halliwell, who was wearing his new Stroud colours for the first time.
There was a close finish in the Under 17 men’s race with Cameron Coetzee winning in 4:48 just a second clear of Bristol & West AC training partner Zac Tobias.
The biggest winner of the afternoon was Naomi Speak, who led from start to finish in the Under 17 women’s race and finished 29 seconds clear of the field.There was a similar win for Miranda Sadler in the Under 15 girls’ race as she cruised home 25 seconds clear while the Under 15 boys’ race saw a good tussle with Emmett Thompson from the Forest of Dean claiming victory.
Under-11 Boys: 1 John Howorth Team Bath 5:41
2 Robert Howorth Team Bath 5:43
3 Anton Mills Bristol & West 5:45
4 Callum Rawlings 5:58
5 Hugh Sadler Bristol & West 6:02
6 Sam Greenleaf Cheltenham 6:08
Under-11 Girls: 1 Harriet Emery North Somerset A C 6:35
2 Hanna Dyer Westbury 6:36
3 Sarah Flower NSAC 6:40
Boys Under-13: 1 Andrew Evans Forest of Dean 5:51
2 Corey Williams NSAC 6:01
3 Ben Stephenson Bristol & West 6:03
Girls Under-13: 1 Angharad Flower NSAC 5:57
2 Ellie Parker NSAC 6:07
3 Jasmin Emery NSAC 6:12
Boys Under-15: 1 Emmett Thompson Forest of Dean 5:20
2 Callum Hanney NSAC 5:23
3 Lewis Nightingale Bristol & West 5:27
Girls Under-15: 1 Miranda Sadler Bristol & West 5:33
2 Katie Grinyer NSAC 5:58
3 Rosie Parsons NSAC 6:03
Under-17 Boys: 1 Cameron Coetzee Clevedon AC 4:48
2 Zak Tobias Bristol & West 4:49
3 Tyrone James Westbury 4:55
4 Adam Speake Bristol 7 West 4:59
Under-17 Girls: 1 Naomi Speake Bristol & West 5:31
2 Kelly Leat Westbury Harriers 6:00
3 Lauren Ellis Westbury Harriers 6:23
Senior/Under-20 Men: 1 Chris Discombe Cardiff AAC 4:27
2 Ieuan Thomas Cardiff AAC 4:28
3 Michael Johnson Cardiff AAC 4:32
4 Martin Flook Bristol & West 4:34
5 Gregg Halliwell Stroud AC 4:46
6 Julian Emery Clevedon AC 4:51
7 Dave Bedwell Bristol & West 5:28
8 Jelle Beekina 5:51
9 Mujeeb Leghari 6:44

The Under-11 Street Sprints produced some great heats and finals with the results as follows:
Boys Under-11
1 Ben Jefferies Wick Primary
2 Joseph Freake Sanford Primary
3 Patrick Haskins St Nicholas Chartry, Clevedon
4 Ethan Preddy Holymead
5 James Watson
Girls Under-11
1 Emma Warrington Bristol Grammar School
2 Sophie Parker NSAC
3 Isobel Harris Christchurch Junior
4 Katie Parker NSAC
5 Lucy Shepherd Chandag

COACH Keith Brackstone was thrilled to see Claire Hallissey retain her Bristol half marathon this morning.
Starting steadily the Bristol & West AC international soon got into her rhythm and surged through her rivals from fifth to first by the halfway mark.
From then on there was no stopping Hallissey as she crossed the line in 72minis 02secs, which remarkably is exactly the same time as she ran last year.
“That was an awesome run by Claire,” said Brackstone. “At eight miles she was going like a train and it was a fantastic run considering she only came home from America on Thursday.”
The manner in which Hallissey sprinted down the finishing straight outside the @Bristol building as she watched the clock tick towards 72 minutes suggested there was a degree of frustration at missing her PB,
“I thought I was further off the time than that because I started quite conservatively. Without the wind and the wet cobbles I would have broken 72 minutes easily,” said Hallissey.
There is no doubt that landmark will be broken in the near future but yesterday 72 minutes acquired greater significance because it is the qualifying time set by UK Athletics to be considered for selection for the World Half Marathon Championships in China.
Hallissey would like to run that race but if she is over-looked then she won’t be overly upset as her big target this autumn is her marathon debut in New York.

Women: 1 Claire Hallissey (B&W) 72:02; 2 Tanith Maxwell (South Africa) 74:36; 3 Sarah Kiptoo (Kenya) 74:53.

THE proud African tradition in the Bristol half marathon was maintained by Kenyan Edwin Kipyego.
The 19-year-old made it a Bristol double as he added the half title to the success in the 10k earlier this year, surging clear at five miles to clock a time of 63mins 08secs.
In the wet and blustery conditions that was a class performance and was the second quickest time on the course, only eleven seconds shy of Julius Kibet’s best set in 2003.
It put him 1mins 24secs clear of runner-up Shiferaw Tewodros, the 2007 champion from Ethiopia. Third and top Brit, so also winning the gold medals for the UK and England Championships, was Aldershot, Farnham & District’s Andy Vernon, who clocked an encouraging 64:43 on his debut at the distance.
“It was not as tough as I thought it would be and I felt very strong at the end,” said Vernon, who started off steadily.

IN the battle to finish top local runner in-form Westbury Harrier Matt Ellis took the honours - and in what style.
The 32-year-old finished a fine 30th overall in a time of 70:42, to smah his previoous PB of 74:11 set in the Gloucestere half in July.
It put Ellis just ten seconds and one place ahead of Clevedon AC’s Stuart Leaney. Bristol & West’s Steve McGuigan, who had the extra motivation of keeping ahead of his clubmate Hallissey, was 33rd (1:11.37) with fellow B&W runner Matt Crane 37th.
Ben Morley, of Great Western Runners, was 39th having been forced to stop with cramp at one stage.
Mike Blackmore, of Bitton Road Runners, also made the top fifty in 48th (1:14.50).

THE sudden downpour appears to have caught out the chip timing system yesterday. Numerous runners were crossing the finish line without their chips attached to their running shoes – which effectively means they didn’t cross the line at all.
I’m told that the Portway was littered with chips and the problem seems to have occurred with runners who didn’t thread the chips through their laces as extra security and relied – not unreasonably –on the adhesive tape provided with the chip.
“Unfortunately a number of runners lost their ChampionChip during the race and we are looking into why that happened,” said a statement from the organisers.
“We have successfully used the ChampionChip for the last three years for both the half marathon and the 10k and ChampionChip have been used extensively for the past five years in this country and they have never experienced problems like this before.
“We can only apologise to the runners for what happened.”
One local runner who had a problem was Westbury Harriers’ Emma D’Alton.
“I only noticed at nine miles that my chip had come off,” said D’Alton. “I wondered whether it was worth continuing as I wouldn’t get an official time but I decided to keep on going.2
On her own watch D’Alton clocked a personal best of 1hr 19mins 38secs, shaving 12 seconds off her previous best and was second local runner home behind overall winner Claire Hallissey.