The second EYAL match was a lot warmer and drier than our first at Norwich. The girls had a fantastic day winning the U13s and coming 3rd in both the U15s and U17s. We had 38 PBs and 10 SBs.
As reported previously, Bedford and County athletes enjoyed a successful County Championships at Watford on 13th and 14th May, and some athletes won awards.
Summer is finally starting to feel like it has arrived! Well done to all of the boys team who competed on Sunday – your hard work in training is really paying off. In total we saw personal bests in 24 events, with a number of the boys who are starting to move up the performance levels. Please check out https://www.englandathletics.org/competitions-and-events/pb-awards/ for more information and see what your personal level is.
The first EMAC League match took place at Milton Keynes on Wednesday 10 May, and everyone travelling over through the torrential rain was, I’m sure, ready for a thoroughly wet evening, but the clouds broke and the sun shone.
For Bedford and County AC the evening started well with ‘new Masters’ Darren Kerr (M50) and Glen Kerr (M45) taking first place in the hammer, and on the track Adam winning the 1 mile walk.
On a much warmer and drier Sunday than our first match we competed in the first YDL at Bedford. This was a tough competition for the youngest members of our club as we were up against very strong U13 & U15 teams from Brighton, Cambridge Harriers, Crawley, Herne Hill and Woodford Green. To their credit the athletes battled very hard in every event they took part in.
The girls had 6 first time athletes, 31 personal bests and 5 season’s bests. Our only A string win came from Serena in the U13 800m in 2.27.89, nearly 5 seconds clear of second, not bad for a debutant race!
The weather was a far cry from the miserable rain we experienced at the Norwich meet two weeks ago, which made for better running conditions.
We had a number of first timers competing on Sunday, a big well done to them, it must have felt very daunting for you, but everyone tried their best! There have now been lots of personal bests set, so there is now a benchmark to work on for future events.
The competition in the YDL is very tough, but all of the boys worked very hard and should be very proud of getting stuck in. We had a number of personal bests
Lyla Danobrega (U17) and Euan Supple (U20) both turned in excellent performances at the Steeplechase Festival at Bury at Edmunds on Saturday 29th April, with both athletes well inside the English schools qualifying times. Lyla broke her PB for the 1500m Steeplechase with a time of 5:21.0. This is provisionally a new club U17 and overall record for the event. Euan front ran his 2000m steeplechase from gun to tape to win by over 4 seconds in a time of 6:14.7 Lyla and Euan's excellent early season form puts them both in the top 5 in the uk rankings for their age groups.
Despite the distance travelled to Norwich and the appalling rain that lasted practically all day the girls’ team started the track and field season amazingly well. We fielded an almost full team with 12 debutant athletes and 9 returning athletes who set new personal bests. The U13s and U15s finished 4th and the U17s finished 3rd. There were A string wins in U15s for Mia in discus and Chloe in pole vault, and in the U17s for Lily in 800m and Lyla in 1500m. B string wins came in the U13s from Bronwyn in 200m, and in the U17s Ariarne in 100m, Jessica in 1500m and Case-Mae in triple jump.
A big thank you goes out to all the parents that helped Martyn with the club’s officiating duties.
Tina Blackwell
Girls’ Team Manager
The 2023 English Schools Cross-Country Championships took place at Wollaton Park, Nottingham on Saturday 18th March.
On a testing course with intermittent showers at Nottingham’s Wollaton Park all members of the Bedfordshire team gave of their best, but the undoubted stars of the show for Bedford and County were Noah Campion and Lyla Danobrega.
First and second claim Bedford and County Masters Athletes were in action on Sunday 26th February representing Eastern Masters in the Masters Inter-Area Championship where the various regions of England (East, Midlands, London, Southern , South West, North etc) compete against Wales and Scotland.
In a very high standard competition that saw British age group records broken, the Eastern Masters' Team - managed by Bedford's Graeme Packman - was very successful winning the men's competition out of 9 teams, and coming close runners up in the Ladies' Competition such that they won the overall combined competition trophy too.
Nine Bedford athletes were in action on behalf of the EMAC team, setting a number of club records along the way.
Several Bedford and County athletes enjoyed success at the England Athletics Indoor Championships held in Sheffield 11th / 12th Feb.
Jasmine Wilkins, despite running with some soreness to her back ran 7.73 secs in the heats of the 60m, and 7.79secs in semi final.
Daniel Harding-Forbe lowered his p.b. from the previous week's run by returning a time of 50.89 secs in the 400m, another new club indoor under 20 best.
Both Jasmine and Daniel were a little disappointed with their performances, but overall accepted that it should stand them in good stead for the outdoor season ahead.
Thaila-Jade Mason (under U17) achieved a 60m hurdles PB of 9.16 seconds, and reached the semi-finals. She also Long Jumped 5.00m, finishing in eleventh place.
