HARRIERS VETS MASTER THE EMIRATES

After some excellent performances from the Senior and Junior runners on the Saturday, it was the turn of the clubs Veteran runners to make their mark at the Scottish Masters Indoor Championships on Sunday at the impressive Emirates arena in Glasgow.

The standard of competition was high, with many athletes travelling from England to participate in the events, many of them sporting Great Britain vests which marked them out as athletes who had represented their country.

First up on the track was Anna Walker who capped a memorable day by securing two Gold medals with a personal best in the 60m of 8.82 and a season’s best of 29.67 in the 200m.

 

Next up was Robert Lindsay in the 800m race and after leading for most of the race he was eventually beaten into second place by Birmingham based runner Mike Toal, earning an indoor best of 2.10.99 in the process. Despite tired legs, he managed a PB of 26.80 in the 200m final 40 minutes later.

 

On paper, the 1500m events were amongst the most competitive races and so it proved as both Neil Walker and Connell Drummond toed the line in the V35 and V40 races respectively.

Neil, who is focussing on track this summer after a year of Marathon training, set his stall out early by taking the lead for the first half of the race and finished with a very creditable 4.34.98, a huge 7 second personal best for the former Commonwealth Games cyclist.

At the recent Harriers award presentation, the man of the evening with a very impressive trophy haul was Connell Drummond who smashed his PBs in a range of distances in 2015. He got 2016 off to a flyer with a 10 second PB improvement in his 1500m race in a time of 4.51.59.

In the field events, Kilmarnock stalwart Harald Bartl represented the club in the High Jump. Harald has an excellent record in the masters High Jump and once again he didn’t disappoint. Harald cleared a height of 1 meter 45 cms to claim the Gold Medal.

Once again the Masters are leading from the front, well done.

 

Thanks to Robert Lindsay for the report and Colin Young Photography.