In the second round of the Southern Athletics League (SAL) fixtures on 19th May, Crawley made the most of their home advantage for a narrow win in their Division 1 match against Norwich, Bournemouth AC and Nene Valley Harriers. They beat Norwich by just five points scoring 199 to 194.
Crawley did not have many wins, but they covered most events, unlike the other teams. Multi-eventer, Jo Rowland, was the stand out performer with victories in the javelin, discus, shot, long jump, high jump and hurdles and a second place in the 200m. Basically Rowland did a full heptathlon swapping the 800m for discus!
Crawley is now seventh overall in their division with 366 match points and six league points.
In Division 2E Brighton & Hove was hosting the fixture against Eastbourne Rovers, a composite team from Ipswich Harriers and Colchester & Tendring and Bexley AC.
Brighton took a relatively easy win with 239 points ahead of Eastbourne on 195. The V45’s were out in force for the host club, leading by example. Sarah Hewitt won both the shot and the discus and was second in the hammer, Julia Machin won the 400mH and High Jump and Jo Wilding was first in the ‘B’ High Jump, 400mH and 100mH.
After two fixtures Eastbourne is in third place overall in this division with 403 match points and seven league points and Brighton is just behind in fourth with 420.5 match points and six league points.
In their Division 3 South East fixture, East Grinstead, were up against hosts Hercules Wimbledon, St Mary’s Richmond and St Mary’s University and London City AC. A strong home side won the fixture with 326 from St Mary’s, with East Grinstead in third with 155 points.
Under 17 Rebekah Tyler won the 100m, 200m and Long Jump – the latter two in personal bests, for East Grinstead.
Also at Wimbledon, in the other quarter of the same division, Worthing and composite team Lewes AC and Haywards Heath, faced Cambridge Harriers and Holland Sports/ Dorking & Reigate.
There was a decisive victory for Cambridge with 187 points to Worthing's 124 and Lewes and Haywards Heath were third with 108. Livvy Connor (LEW) won the 100m, Long Jump and Triple Jump. Arena 80's V45, Caroline Hoyte, competing for Worthing, won the 5000m in a season’s best of 17:41.9, while her son Reuben had a 35-second victory margin in the 3K running of 9:14.3.
Hastings and Horsham were at Tooting Bec for their Division 3 South East match. Hastings was second behind hosts Herne Hill Harriers with the tiniest margin of three points 260 to 257. Horsham was a distant fourth with 155 points.
Hastings are third in this division with 569 match points and nine league points. Horsham, East Grinstead and Worthing are in seventh, eighth and ninth place respectively with 396, 337 and 288 Match points - all on seven league points. Lewes and Haywards Heath are in 14th with 194 match points and five league points.
The venue for Chichester’s Division 3 South West match was Winchester, and again the home team came out on top, but only just. They beat Dorset by 4 points with 279 to 275. Chichester was not far behind in third with a score of 243. Their under 17, Liam Dunne, ran a swift 1:55.8 personal best in the 800m for the win. Meanwhile veteran Tim Brown scored maximum points in the discus, hammer and shot.
Chichester is in fifth place with 433 match points and seven league points.
View the results on Po10 and on the SAL website.