UK Women's League - Match 2

Sunday 8 June - Kingston

It was a tough day in the sunshine for our Belgrave Ladies team as we endeavoured to use our home advantage to try and claim a win and push ourselves up the table in the UKWL. With a strong team at the start of the week we were confident we could push for the win but alas, injuries and last minute niggles claimed many of our squad so the remaining ladies had to rally to keep our chances of promotion alive.

Playing the field

It was all hands on deck in the field with no fewer than five ladies putting in an appearance in the throws. Rachel Basford put in a great performance in the tightly contested hammer A and shot put B competitions before testing her foot out on the sprint hurdles. Hazel Mead made her season’s debut for the club in the B string hammer and in between tallying the results Jodie Albrow also managed to step out onto the field to claim second place for the club in the javelin A.

Battered from the previous days boxing endeavours new find Elena Narozanski made her UKWL debut in fine form in the shot put A and managed a notable second place in the discus B, with Leanne Bettis managing to compose herself after a shaky start to throw very well in the discus A and javelin B events and continue her comeback.

Sprints Queens and Long Distance Ladies

It was a day of mixed fortune, breakthroughs and pitching in for the track team. In between practice exams Flo Skinner managed to pop in to run a cheeky 400mH for the team which was well received. Whilst Jess Case finally broke the spell on her four stride taboo in the sprint hurdles to back up her performance in the 400H and even threw in a 200m A string for good measure before joining the two relay teams to round out her day.

Our sprints and jumps duo Sandra Dike and Emma Watkins both continued their season’s strong form with solid performances in the long jump and 100m before both fell afoul of injury niggles before the day was out – we wish our ladies a speedy recovery.

Having started the week as reserve for all events super-sub Helen Brown found herself faced with a full fixture listed being called upon for the 400m B, 200m B, triple jump, 4x100 and 4x400 relays! Helen’s performances exemplified the true team spirit of the ladies team in pitching in came hell or high-water.

Rose O’Brien ran a tough 800m with the Herne Hill and Exeter ladies pushing her all the way to record a successive PB in the UKWL whilst managing to stay lucid long enough to make a brief appearance in the high jump post-race and stumbled around a 400m A race before joining the two relay teams at the end of the day.

The solid trio of Fiona Maddocks, Zoe Smith and Mel Wilkins held up the long distance events are garnered much needed points for the team. Old faithful Fiona turned up to the track believing it was just the 800m for her but found herself with a 1500m added to the schedule and nonchalantly set about collecting a couple of second places and a healthy 14pts for the team before pitching in for the 4x400 relay. Not to be outdone, Zoe Smith claimed victory in her return to track racing in the 3000m B race and managed to zip around for third in the 1500m A race.

Raring to go and ready to see what the UKWL had to offer our cross country queen Mel Wilkins ran a solid second in the 3000m A before dominating the women’s 2000m steeplechase. Mel romped around the track in style to smash the club record by 52 seconds in a time of and 7:08.00 and claim victory for the Bels.

So Close Yet So Far

Whilst it was a day of personal triumphs for many and great showings of team spirit and commitment it was unfortunately not enough to claim victory for our ladies. With just a few too many key people missing and restrictions on events we found ourselves finishing in fourth place yet again. However it is still fairly close at the top and anything could happen in the closing fixture at Wigan with all to play for.

A special thanks to all of our officials who came and gave their time to support, measure, record and officiate for us – Bob Bridges, Bill Laws, Carl Lawton, Tony Fairclough, Gillian Fairclough, Charlie Dickinson, Lorna Campbell – these events couldn’t happen without you!

Next fixture: Sunday 9^th August - Wigan

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Full Match Results

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Match Result

Overall Standings

All News, Track and FieldAdministratorJune 9, 2015track2015