Silver Medal For Gala Ladies At East Distric Championships
October 17th, 2007A stunning start to the cross country season brought home a silver medal winning performance by the Gala Harriers’ Ladies’ A team in Dunfermline’s Duloch Park on Saturday.
In near perfect running conditions, a great turnout of 23 Gala runners fought their way through the Forth Road Bridge delays to deliver some excellent performances for the Club on this, the first cross country race of the season. Rigorous training and fine performances on the road and hills over the summer months obviously paid off as all those competing equipped themselves well, with some outstanding individual times.
In the Young Females race, the twins Emily and Hannah Jones, running in their first District relay event put in excellent and almost identical performances with only 4 seconds separating their two runs – 10 minutes 58 seconds and 11.03 respectively, with Gillian Ingles completing a gutsy final leg of 12.01 to bring them home in 15th place out of 28 finishing teams.
There were solid runs too by Laura Anderson (11.30) and Kerry Bonnar (12.40) but with no third member, their team was unplaced, but the experience was undoubtedly a useful one for the young runners.
Laura Goodson, formerly of Gala Harriers but running for Edinburgh Athletic Club was part of the bronze medal winning team.
Three senior mens’ teams made it to the start line, with mens’ captain Graeme Murdoch setting the standard for the A team with a superbly strong first leg of 13.52, complemented by Gregor McAnemy (15.52), Fergus Johnston (14.30) and brought home by Rob McCrirrick in 15.11, ensuring that the team finished in a very respectable 18th place out of 54 teams.
The B team, consisting of Derek Brydon (16.26), new Harrier Neil Black (16.32), Martin Clarke (15.56) and Alastair Wright (15.55) were in 34th place overall and the C team of Malky Gowans (17.01), John Paterson (17.34), Robin Murray (18.51) and Davy Darroch in 18.29 completed a solid day of performances in 46th place.
It was the Gala women whose stars were in the ascendancy however with a start from Katy Anderson for the A team that they could only have dreamed of – she ran a stunning first leg of 15.44, finishing only 3 seconds behind young internationalist Lynsey Sharp, handing on to the safe hands of Rachel Fagan who, although injured, passed the baton to Dianne Lauder in a time of 16.12, who in turn brought the girls home in a superb second place with a breathtaking time of 15.32 and beaten only by Central AC, one of the strongest clubs in the country.
Just a little further down the field, the ladies’ B team of Mel Goodson (17.37), Gillian Duncan (17.34) and Fiona Dalgleish in 17.02 finished in 13th place, with Fiona outkicking Britain’s top 400 metre hurdler Ailidh Child in the race for the line.
With such a great start to the season, the Harriers can look forward to the next months with growing confidence and their next outing is on Saturday 20th October in Broxburn for the East Cross Country League. (For the Sporting Week Ahead please).
