Veteran athletes from Worcester Athletic Club celebrated the end of the 2022 league season with a string of convincing victories in the South Midlands Veteran’s League.
Due to the pandemic, it was the first athletics match to be held at the Worcester’s Nunnery Wood venue for three years.
Impressive results across the team saw the club win both the men’s and women’s games.
The league positions for Worcester men and women mean the club have qualified for the Midland Vet Regional Cup final, where they will face clubs from all three league divisions, spanning the whole of the Midlands .
The final is due to take place this Sunday, September 4.
Male results
Worcester athletes won the first two 200m races of the night, with Richard White and Laurence Oldfield winning the over 60 and over 70 races respectively.
Ben Reeves then showed great composure in the more than 40 races, finishing in 25 seconds flat, his second best time over the distance.
Worcester swept the board in the 800m races with Dave Price, Matt Moon and Derek Jackson winning the M35, M40 and M60 respectively.
In the 4x100m, the unrivaled quartet of Richard Houchin, David Shaw, Henry Hopkins and Ben Reeves won by a whopping margin of almost four seconds in 52.4 seconds.
David Shaw In the long jump pit made a massive leap of 4:81 to win the M60 event, propelling him to third place in the UK M60 standings.
Marc Flannery also excelled in the M60 26:45m hammer throw and the M40 9:82m shot put, winning both very easily.
Mel Garland had a successful day through a series of events
Women’s results
The opening event was W50 Discus where Worcester team leader Mel Garland, who recently returned from the World Masters Championships, achieved one of his best distances of the season (19.84m) to clinch first place and eight team points.
Garland was back later, this time in the W40 triple jump, where she once again claimed maximum points for the Worcester Vet Ladies.
Dropping an age group, Iris Holder represented the club in the W70 long jump, her first jump of 2.02m too strong for the opposition
In the field events, the Worcester ladies scored 37 out of a possible 40, with Bromsgrove & Redditch club on 32 and Stratford 27.
The airside of the competition begins with the 200m races, with Louise Kirby winning the W50 class with a time of 32.4 seconds.
Then in the 800m races, Vickie Watkins came back from injury to run a solid 2’53.8 and collect seven team points in the W35 category.
Ros Townsend-Hope in the W60 age group raced very well but found herself up against former European and World Champion Nancy Hitchmough and finished second with a time of 3’17.1.
The last track event of the evening was the women’s 4x100m relay.
Angela Bryant in the first leg did well to keep Worcester in contact before Amy Pinkney exploded the backstretch to open a lead of around 25m.
Sara Saunders replaced the injured Garland and was able to take the lead.
Nicola Guiver then took over for the home stretch as spectators cheered the Worcester Vet Ladies relay team to victory.
When the scores were tallied, the Worcester Ladies had won the match by a considerable margin, 22 points, with Stratford second and Bromsgrove & Redditch third.
The win saw Worcester Vet Ladies win the South Midlands Division of the Midland Veteran’s T&F League.
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