Last week we reported the absence of Sussex teams from the Annual South of England 12 Stage road relay for the first time for a decade after changes to the venue and date.
What we overlooked was the women’s six stage race, which for the first time had four short 4.2k and two long 6.2k stages, where the Brighton & Hove team finished an excellent ninth.
In recent years the women had run six short stage legs and on more than one occasion the Arena 80 club has gained top ten placings and even medals but ninth place, over the new format, has created a new standard for Sussex.
Ironically, although they won the Sussex cross-country team title, the Brighton & Hove women have not had a particularly good winter season but at the traffic free but windy and chilly Cyclopark at Gravesend they excelled themselves.
This year just legs two and four were long legs and Rachel Titheradge set the team up with a steady opening leg where she finished 21st in 16:24 before Martha Coyle ran a spanking second leg moving up five places in 23:34, a position that Phoebe Connolly, like Coyle still an U20 athlete, held in 17:15 on the third leg.
Helena Tobin took the team up four places on the fourth leg clocking 23:41 before Jeanette Kenneally held on the 12th place in 17:54 and over the final circuit Emma Dixon, showing signs of a return to the form she had shown three years back, moved through to ninth on the final leg in 15:19, which was to prove the seventh fastest short lap of the race.
Crawley open
Also last Sunday Crawley had a fine turnout for the first of the pre-season Open track meetings.
K2 is designed well to shelter the athletes from the pre dominantly sou-westers of the summer months but provides little shelter for the bitter nor-easter that swept across the track on Sunday.
This made conditions particularly uncomfortable for the officials who spent several hours on duty.
The track races were mainly at non standard distances but served well to break the ice as far as sprinters were concerned and although cold the wind would have been of some assistance to them.
Standing around in the cold and trying to keep warm waiting for your next attempt in the throws and jumps is a problem but despite this there were at least three English Schools standards by Under 17 athletes.
Into the teeth of the wind Harry Baker from Horsham did remarkably well in the U17 age group to soar over 1.93m.
Hammer throwers, are not usually affected too much by the wind, and Worthing’s Ben Hawkes in his first year in the U17 age group sent the implement soaring out to 55.28m while Vicki Pellett (Crawley) reached 53.55m all three efforts were personal bests and that’s a good way to start the season.