Promising start for Mansfield Harriers at the Mini League

A tremendous competition saw the club placed second behind Rushcliffe by the narrowest possible margin of one point. The league is a seven club competition for the Under 11,13 and 15 age groups where each age group has it’s own competition with an overall club winner.

Scoring is your first three athletes to finish in an age group with the total score of the six age group results giving the overall winning team.

The club won both Under 15 age groups with a string of impressive performances with the girls taking the lowest possible score of six points with Charley Whysall 1st, Maisy Slack 2nd and Isla Milnes 3rd, followed by great packing from Myannie Westwood 5th, Emily Pares 6th and Martha Walker 7th.

The Under 15 boys was a much closer affair with Mansfield winning by 1 point, following on from his fantastic run at the Midland Road Relays Jack Pares was a comfortable winner with Ollie McClemens continuing his fine form in 3rd, Teddy Macintyre placed 6th and Dan Adams 7th.

The Under 13 girls matched the Under 15 team with a clean sweep and a superb finish from Olivia Wright saw her pip Evie Clifton in the home straight with Martha Manson taking 3rd place.

Showing significant improvement since last winter Lauren Pate placed 6th, Maisey Gill 8th, Maisie Lowe 9th and Evelyn Wheat 12th. The under 13 boys placed a very close second with Oliwier Macutkiewicz having his best run do date in a blue and green vest as he put in a strong last quarter to take the win with Will McClemens having a terrific run 5th for place. In his first run for the club James Govier showed great promise to place 7th.

The club struggled in the Under 11 age groups with only two athletes competing in each age group which meant the third scorer was the last finisher plus one which ultimately cost the team a clear win.

Esme Evans put in a strong run for 3rd in the girls race with debutant Isla Huntington impressing in 18th. Jack Whysall had a good run for 7th in the boys race with Austin Wright coming home in 21st.

The Nottingham half marathon was the first appearance for Sam McCraken in a club vest and he showed great promise for the future as he recorded an impressive 82.51.

The first Mansfield athlete home was Dave “speedy” Savage who a week after racing the Belfast Half Marathon was only a few seconds outside his best time with 78.38. Adam Wright used the race as a prep run for an upcoming focused 10K race recorded 7942, Andy Walker had a good race to record 91.30, and after a block of training Helen Jones recorded a big improvement on her best with 91.38.

Emma Mason recorded a new best time of 1.53.17, Jack Skillington finished in 1.58.52, Andy Longmead 2.03.27, Alistair Holliman 2.03.34, Laura Hayes 2.17.58 and Peter Craggs 2.26.56.

Sian Thornton travelled to the Lake District to run the 2 Valleys Trail event which was raced over 20K and with close to 500 metres in elevation. Sian ran superbly to record 2.32.59 for the race which placed her 260th out of the 532 finishers.