The last of this seasons league fixtures was held at Central Park Arena, Dartford on Friday 19th July.
The women’s team went in to the match in 2nd place overall, but only 3 points ahead of Medway & Maidstone so knew a strong performance would see them in to the season ending finals.
The men had done enough to stave off relegation at fixture 5 and now found themselves in a fight for 3rd with Cambridge Harriers, with Tonbridge and Dartford too far ahead to catch. Again only 3.5 points separated 3rd and 4th so all to play for.
The field events this week were High Jump and Long Jump for the women, Triple Jump for the men, with the Discus for both. On the track there was the 100m, 800m and the lesser run 4 x 200m relay.
The track program began with the 800m races. Dartford’s Kat Sutton, outstanding all season, took the win in the W35 A race, but 2nd place went to Jennie Butler, who held off the Medway athlete by a couple of seconds, finishing in 2:37.7.
In the B race, the clubs were reversed with Sarah Belaon finishing 3rd with a new PB of 2:52.8.
The W50 800m was the closest race of the night with only 0.6 of a second separating the first three. Club President Ashley Pearson was just edged into 3rd place in a near seasons best 2:40.9
There was a seasons best performance by Jackie Montgomery in the W60 race who secured 2nd place in a time of 3:28.1
In the mens 800m races, Ben Hakki ran a PB 2:15.8 in the M35 A race, whilst Team Manager Steve Hough stepped up to run the B race and finish 5th in a seasons best 2:25.7.
In the M50 race Luca Ercolani once again secured the win with his trademark sprint finish in a time of 2:19.0 secs. It was Luca’s 5th win out of 6 races making him the highest average points scorer on the Men’s team this season – fantastic work!
The 100m races were next and in a tight finish Daniela Sage was able to hold on to win the W35 race in a (then) PB of 13.6 secs. And in the B race Katy Sugden ran a seasons best 16.3 secs for 3rd place.
Ashley Pearson doubled up on the night to finish 2nd in the W50 race in a PB time 15.7 secs.
The other Ashley (Reid) came 2nd in the M35 A race in a seasons best 12.0, and Tim Ayres stepped up at the last minute to replace Matt Ellerton (who was injured in the Triple Jump earlier in the night) and finished 4th in a seasons best 14.2 secs.
Ian Firla finished 5th in the M50 race, and club stalwart Ken Daniel stepped into unfamiliar territory to grab a point and a PB in the M60 race finishing in 18.5 seconds.
In the field, the aforementioned Matt Ellerton secured 3rd place in the M35 Triple Jump with a leap of 9.32m, whilst Ian Firla jumped 8.62m for 4th place in the M50 – both seasons bests.
It was the Long Jump for the women with Jackie Montgomery again in action in the W50 event, finishing 4th by just 1cm with a best jump of 3.16m.
In the W35 Daniela Sage finished 2nd in a seasons best 4:10m, again by just 2cms – fine margins, but great efforts!
Daniela was also jumping vertically on the night tying for 4th place in the W35 High Jump with a 1.15m PB.
Similarly Jackie was tied for 2nd in the W60 with a PB of 1m, whilst Ashley Pearson finished 4th in the W50 event. Both jumped PB’s of 1m.
In the Discus there were 6th place finishes for Tim Ayres (M35), Mark Ellison (M60) and Jennie Butler (W35) whilst Simon Tolson threw a PB 25.52m in the M50.
The season was finished off on the track with the 4 x 200m relays.
The men’s team (Ian Firla, Tim Ayres, Steve Hough, Ashley Reid) finished 4th in their race (1:51.3 secs) and 4th overall for the season.
It was decent season for the men, having had to deal with injuries and unavailability but they’ll hope for more consistency in 2025 in order to move up the final standings.
The women’s team (Daniela Sage, Katy Sugden, Ashley Pearson, Jennie Butler) finished a place higher in 3rd (2:06.9).
Their efforts on the night meant they finished above Medway in 2nd for this fixture, and therefore also finished 2nd overall qualifying for the regional finals.
This was so impressive, especially as they only used 14 athletes across all 6 fixtures which meant doing multiple events each night and often unfamiliar ones.
A fantastic effort, well deserved and we all wish you good luck for finals day!
The finals will be held at Horspath Athletics Ground, Oxford, OX4 2RR on Saturday 31st August
Spectators are welcome and if anyone is available to help out with any officiating of the field events then that would be much appreciated.
Ashley Reid
