National Masters Champs, and Various Road Races Provide Excellent Performances

NATIONAL MEDALS FOR KILMARNOCK QUARTET

Aberdeen was the setting for this year’s Scottish Masters Championships and four Kilmarnock athletes made the 350 mile round trip to the North East of Scotland to take part.

Despite heavy downpours back home, the sun was out at the Aberdeen Sports Village as Anna Walker was first to take to the track in the 100m and duly took the gold medal in a season’s best time of 13.97. A couple of hours later she was to replicate this achievement in the 200m and in the process broke her PB in a time of 29.01.

Next up was Robert Lindsay in the men’s 800m race which he duly won in 2.10 to take his first national gold, following this up with a PB and bronze medal in the 400m event in a time of 56.80.

Harald Bartl was the club’s sole field athlete in the unfortunate absence of Alex Macintosh who took several medals last year. Competing in the V55 age category, Harald took an impressive haul of two gold and one silver medal after performing in the High Jump – 1.50m, Pole Vault – 2.70m and Javelin – 30.18m, and in the process achieved season’s best markers in all three.

Last up in the most competitive race of the day was Gordon Reid in the 1500m event, and with half a dozen runners all capable of running sub 4.35 it was always going to be a tough race. So it proved to be with Gordon putting in an excellent performance to take the Silver medal in a PB of 4.30 and claim his first national medal since his heyday as a teenage runner at the club.

After the count was tallied up at the end of the day, Kilmarnock Harrier athletes had an excellent haul of 5 Gold, 2 Silver and 1 Bronze to show for their efforts, and did themselves and their Club proud.

ARRAN HALF MARATHON

On Sunday, 2 Kilmarnock Harriers and a former member were in Arran to take part in the islands annual half Marathon and on a hilly course all did well.

Windy conditions awaited the 100+ athletes but on the day after a strong run throughout it was Scott Martin who was first home overall in a time of 1.18.05 for his second half marathon victory after his Barry Buddon win of 2014.

Teammate Matt Dodds was also in the field and after some strong runs over the same course in recent years too had an excellent run. Matt clocked 1.39.42 which took 2^nd place in his age category to further cement the good weekend the Harriers were having.

Finally, Andy Taylor ran an excellent 1.43.55 and next race on the cards for him, and many other Harriers will be the Ayrshire Half Marathon Championships at Girvan this coming Sunday.

At the Scottish Veteran Harriers 5k Championships on Wednesday Connell Drummond toed the line and crossed the line in a fine 17.18 for 18^th place overall in a high quality field of athletes of aged 35 and over. Special mentions too go to popular former member Keith Haining who continues to impress as he clocked 16.55 and under his pre race sub 17 minute target.

Amongst some excellent recent improvements by many at Kilmarnock Harriers was member Stewart McRoberts who smashed his 10k personal best time for the second time in a week as he competed in the Men’s Health 10K Road Race in Glasgow last weekend.

Dipping under 44 minutes for the first time at Roon the Toon, Stewart followed that up at the Bellahouston 10k 5 days later, before rounding of a successful week by knocking another 27 seconds off of his time by running 42.44 and in his own words was “absolutely buzzing”. Stewart’s efforts placed him just outside the top 200 in a field of well over 2,000 so it was a great result.

More details as ever at www.kilmarnockharriers.com