Double joy for Dan as Stratford AC win opener in style
STRATFORD AC secured a crushing victory in the first Midland League meeting of the season at Leamington Spa on Saturday.
After just missing out on promotion in 2016, the Stratford AC team were looking forward to a good season with a number of new athletes in the 31-strong team, covering 35 different events including four relays.
The strong Stratford team didn’t disappoint and dominated the event from start to finish eventually winning by a massive 122 points.
Not only did Stratford have a quality team, they also had the full complement of two athletes in every event which shows how important every athlete is.
Making debuts in the senior team were Rowan Love (high jump), Daisy Musk and Archie Musk (800m), Daniel Hague (100m and javelin), Robin Kindersley (5,000m), Jon Mulkeen (200m and long jump), Eleanor Gotrel (javelin), Olivia Hall (400m and 800m) and Henry Grisenthwaite and Adam Bayliss (400m) and this mixture of youth and experience paid dividends.
Although everyone played their part, some of the highlights were Dan Boyd winning a sprint double in the 100m and 200m and having the equal best long jump although coming second on countback.
Boyd was delighted to get personal bests in both the 200m and long jump.
Cavan Farrow won the triple jump by over a metre in a new PB, as well as coming third in both the 400m hurdles, where she claimed another PB, and javelin.
One of the most dominant wins of the day was Alice Reed winning the 3,000m by 86 seconds from team-mate Emma Bexson.
Despite the solo run, Reed improved her PB by ten seconds from her only previous 3,000m race three days earlier.
Emily Madden Forman also had a busy day, winning the triple jump and coming second in the 100m hurdles and long jump.
When it comes to busy though Emma Bexson who won the B sprint hurdles, was fourth in the 400m hurdles, first in the B 3,000m and then did the hammer for good measure.
And that’s what Sarah Bland did, doing all four throws events, winning the B 1500m and getting valuable points in the B high jump.
Stratford finished the day with very strong relay teams. The men’s team were third in the 4x100m and second in the 4x400m. The women’s teams were even more successful, coming second and first respectively.
The team is now looking forward to the next fixture at Burton-on-Trent at the start of June.
Final team positions: 1 Stratford-on-Avon AC 437pts, 2 Charnwood AC 315, 3 Burton AC 309, 4 Daventry AAC 268, 5 Dudley Stourbridge Harriers 244, 6 Hereford & County AC 226, 7 Kettering Town Harriers 174.
