Coventry Godiva Harriers

The weekend was a busy one for Coventry Godiva Harriers being taken up with the Senior and Young Athletes Road relays at Sutton Park and the Midland Masters Open Road Relays at Donisthorpe Woodland Park, Derbyshire. Within the Senior relays there were also the Midland events previously due to be held on 23rd March but called off due to heavy fall of snow.
The results for the club’s teams in these events are listed below. The outstanding performance of the weekend was by Katrina Wootton who returned the fastest time of the day in the Senior Women’s 6 stage relay. In the masters event Iwan Jones also recorded the fastest time of the day.

ERRA National Road Relay Championships
Senior Men     1st   Notts AC   4:15:56;
20th   Coventry Godiva   4:27:52

Senior Women     1st   Aldershot, Farnham A   1:37:56;
28th   Coventry Godiva   1:57:52
Katrina Wootton - 15:39 fastest of the day

Midland 12 stage Relay
Men     1st     Notts AC     4:15:56
4th     Coventry Godiva     4:27:52

Women     1st     Bristol & West     1:44:13
7th     Coventry Godiva     1:57:52

Young Athletes
Under 17 men     23 teams finished
1st Swansea Harriers     35:56
15th Coventry Godiva 'A'     39:45

Under 15 Boys     39 teams finished
1st Leicester Coritanian AC 'A'     38:18
14th Coventry Godiva 'A'     41:01

Under 13 Boys     46 teams finished
1st Tonbridge AC 'A'     40:48
31st Coventry Godiva 'A'     47:49
45th Coventry Godiva 'B'     52:01

Under 15 Girls     35 teams finished
1st Bracknell AC     42:04
17th Coventry Godiva     48:30

Under 13 Girls     44 teams finished
1st Herne Hill Harriers 'A'     43:11
39th Coventry Godiva 'A'     54:24

Midland Masters Open Road Relay
M35 Godiva     1st     71.32
Iwan Jones - 17.11 fastest leg of the competition

M45 Godiva 'A'     2nd     77.40
Godiva 'B'     3rd     88.02

On a testing course the top results from Godiva athletes were:

Senior Women:   14th - Frances Briscoe
U20 Women:   31st - Naomi Richardson
            (scorer in Warkwickshire team finishing 2nd)
U17 Women:   7th - Georgie Hartigan
                         9th - Sian Rainsley
U13 Girls:   58th - Bethan Hinett
Senior Men:   60th - Chris Bannon
U15 Boys:   29th - Ben Goldie

Well done to all of the club's participants on a very muddy course.

Back nearer to home at the NIA in Birmingham pride of place for Godiva went to Jeremy Barnes who was a fine 2nd in the Under 17 men's 800m in a new pb of 1:57.25. In the Under 15 sprints Morgan Amed reached the final in both the 60m and 200m.

Under 17 Men 60m:   Jordan Leith - 7.53 (ht),   Jordan Broome - 7.19 (ht); 7.15 (SF)

Under 17 Men 800m:   Jeremy Barnes - 1:58.41 (ht); 1:57.25 (2nd Final)

Under 15 Boys 60m:   Morgan Amed - 7.61 (ht); 7.41 (SF) 7.61 (8th Final)

Under 15 Boys 200m:   Morgan Amed - 23.76 (SF); 23.96 (4th final)

Under 17 Women 60m:   Wadzanai Mugara - 8.32

Under 17 Women 60m H:   Annabelle Pask - 9.03 (ht); 9.19 (SF)

Under 17 Women LJ:   Annabelle Pask - 5.17m 10th

The highlight of the English cross country season took place at Herrington Country Park near Sunderland in weather conditions which were as bad as experienced over the history of the event. Heavy snow fall in the hours up to the first race with the under lying wet surfaces meant that a quagmire welcomed most of the competitors.

Of the Godiva athletes pride of place went to Frances Briscoe who continued her superb winter with a fine 8th place. The women's team were a sound 9th. The men had a sound result closing in in 13th place in the 6 to score event and 12th in the 9 to score. Sian Rainsley was a good 18th in the Under 17 women's event.

Senior Men   1084 finishers
1st  [Keith Gerrard]  41:21
51st  Matt Lole  44:40
68th  Chris Bannon  45:15
115th  Toby Spencer  46:37
168th  Alistair Smith  48:05
209th  Harvey Speed  49:09
244th  Dan Clarke  50:02
310th  James Griggs  51:42
707th  Mike Peters  60:27
952nd  Martin Slevin  68:30
Team : 6 to score 13th; 9 to score 12th

Under 20 Men   142 finishers
1st    33:47
75th  Jack Villette  38:57

Under 15 Boys   223 finishers
1st    15:02
60th  Cameron Innes  16:59

Senior Women   427 finishers
1st    29:31
8th  Frances Briscoe  31:10
76th  Myshola Kirkham  36:06
122nd Zara Hyde Peters  37:39
193rd  Jayne Mumford  40:45
Team: 9th

Under 17 Women   150 finishers
1st    18:00
18th  Sian Rainsley  19:23

In the men's final Cross Country League match held at Perry Park, Godiva were 2nd on the day and 2nd overall to Loughborough Students. Tom Bark was our leading scorer in 6th position, with a time of 33m 30s. Full results are available here.

In the women's final match held at Cheltenham, Frances Briscoe was the individual winner. Full results are available here.

In the Midland Indoor Championships & U13 Quadrathon there were wins for the following:
Will Suart (Senior Men Shot) - 11.89m
Jeremy Barnes (U17 Men 800m) - 1m 59.72s
Morgan Amed (U15 Boys 60m) - 7.48s (Ht 7.54s) and 200m - 23.58s (Ht 23.55s)
Laura Langowski (Senior Women 400m) - 55.82s (Ht 58.42s)

Under difficult conditions at Stafford Godiva was well represented in the Championships and came away with some success.
The senior men took second team medals with Matt Lole (6th), Tom Bark (12th), Dan Clarke (21st), Damian Carr (25th) and Alistair Smith (47th) the scorers behind first place Notts AC.
In the senior women's race Frances Bristoe was a very good 3rd place whilst in the Under 17 women's Sian Rainsley was third also in a very tight finish.
The only other medal for the Club came in the Under 15 Boys where Ben Goldie (7th), Seb Jones (15th), Cameron Innes (18th) and Matt Crisp (69th) were third A team.

In the West Midland Young Athletes' League competition at The Pingles Georgie Hartigan took first place in the U17 Women's race, 11 seconds clear of second position.

Godiva had a good team win in the 3rd fixture of the Birmingham & District cross Country league yesterday at Sandwell Valley Park. Scoring 92 points they took their first win of the league season but remain in 3rd place overall behind Loughborough Students and Birmingham University.
The league table and positions of the Godiva runners in the 252 finishers are shown here.

Godiva claimed first position in the Warwickshire Championships with Toby Spencer (Sen Men) and Sian Rainsley (U17 Women), while Ben Jones was first in the Merseyside Championships and Frances Briscoe in the Oxfordshire Championships. Good supporting runs also resulted in our achieving several top team positions. Click here for all our results.

Well done to the U17 Women, who just missed out on a medal position while being our highest ranked team. Sian Rainsley led out with the second fastest time overall, and was supported by Georgie Hartigan and Penny Oliver for a final fourth position. Full results are available here.

Congratulations to Ben, who ran in the Dublin Marathon, clocking 2:20:58 for 17th place.

Congratulations to Brendan Boyce, who was selected for Ireland in the Olympic 50k walk. He came 29th, while achieving a personal best time of 3h 55m 01s.
Click here for details of Brendan's career.

And well done to our wheelchair racer Mel Nicholls, who was selected for the 100m and 200m T34 (wheelchair) events at the Paralympic Games. She was 5th in the first round of the 100m, and reached the final to come 7th overall in the 200m.
Click here for her story

Congratulations to Daniel Smith, who achieved a Triple Jump distance of 12.68m in the England Athletics U15/U17 Championships at Bedford. This places him in 3rd position in our Club Records.

Congratulations to Jeremy Barnes (1500m) and Sian Rainsley (800m) on winning Gold in Daegu, South Korea, while representing Coventry in this year's games.

Coventry Godiva Harriers had 6 members representing their counties at the English Schools Championships at Gateshead over the weekend of 6/7 July. Their results were:

Annabelle Pask - Junior Girls Long Jump: 3rd - 5.61m
Daniel Smith - Junior Boys Triple Jump: 5th - 12.23m
Goergie Hartigan - Intermediate Girls 800m: 7th - 2:12.09
Sian Rainsley - Intermediate Girls 1500m: 3rd - 4:35.55
Lucy Smith - Senior Girls Shot: 4th - 11.52m
Nathan Petch - Senior Boys High Jump: No height

Annabelle's jump of 5.61m places her top of the club's U/15 records, 3cm further than Joanne Wise's 1985 mark of 5.58m. Well done Annabelle!

Congratulations to Georgie Hartigan and Sian Rainsley on being selected to run at Olympic Park. They have now done what few others have managed so far! More than that, Georgie's time of 2m 09.24s for the 800m and Sian's time of 4m 38.90s in the 1500m means that they have both attained the required standards for the forthcoming English Schools Championships. Well done again.

There was an impressive turn out from Godiva’s junior athletes, with about 25 athletes taking part, ranging from U11 to U17. There were many fine performances, with highlights being Erin Cunningham running a great 75m in 10.0 sec, and the U15 boys claiming Gold, Silver and Bronze in the 100m, with Morgan and Kai running personal best times. Morgan went on to claim a sprint double gold with a dominant run in the 200m. Congratulations to all athletes who took part on a cold day in Rugby.