After finishing 7th at Match 1, events resumed at Grangemouth Stadium with a hope that Corstorphine AAC could build on their first outing of the year. There were more athletes taking part in the second match than the first: 222 vs. 176. Our team grew by a handful of athletes too.
John Ross, Janet Grigor and Annette Harrison took on officiating duties again. Thanks to you all.
The first half of our afternoons are usually stronger than the finish and, much like Match 1, we started strongly with a win in the Javelin (A. Tom Hunt, 46.03m) and second places in Javelin (B. Patrick Millar, 36.03) and 400mH (Tom Hunt again, 61.27 and James Harrison 69.13) in heavy rain amongst pools on the track. Elliot MacKay and Jacob Scott both racked up scoring Long Jumps and the trickle of points began. We were placed 3rd/8 teams at the first count, not far behind Aberdeen and Edinburgh.
The weather was changeable throughout the afternoon, forcing delays to the Pole Vault competition and making quick running a little more challenging. The team welcomed Moray Anderson back to 800m and the ever reliable Cameron Thores improved on his time from last month by 9 seconds. The whole team consistently exceeded the minimum standards required to score points in the league, keeping the flow trickling. After 10 of 19 events, the announcer placed us 3rd again, though with a weaker second half of the programme to come, as field event results arrive thicker than those from the track.
Euan Stewart dealt well with several recalled starts in the 100m A string to record 11.35s for 4th, before Cole won the B string in 11.28 with a similar wind. James Harrison and Ally Brockie picked up 3rd and 2nd in the Steeplechase. Addisons Stephen and David had a tussle over 1500m and George Key teamed up with Ryan Kyle and Euan Stewart to score in Shot, Discus and Hammer. Geroge even picked up tips on the way to add a metre to his Discus mark.
Stuart Livingstone and David Hall navigated a busy and saturated track for 25 laps, much to the amazement of the fast men in the stands. None were envious! Stuart recorded 32:20 in tough conditions, Dave coming 4th in the B string too. Patrick Millar and Elliot MacKay finished 400m in 55.45 and 56.07 seconds, both making progress on earlier performances. Euan and Cole were 4th and 3rd in the 200m to put us 5th after 16 of 19 events.
The 4x400m was our best performance for quite some time, with Stephen and David Addison, Elliot MacKay and Sam Cavens teaming up to record 3:48.12, comfortably under 4 minutes for the first time in a long time at a Men’s League match.
The end result was that we finished 5th on the day, lifting us from 7th to 6th in the league table. And we collected the large shield for the most improved club of 2018 too.
The standard of competition yesterday was very high. The 800m races were won in 1:52 and 1:56, 1500m in 3:55. A new League Pole Vault record was set at 5.25m, someone triple jumped over 15m, a hammer was thrown 65m and 10,000 wet metres were covered in 30:20 by one man. There were several internationalists among those 222 athletes, mixed in with old hands and young men making their first forays into senior competition.
Our next match will be in Aberdeen on 21st July. The club has arranged a bus to take athletes and officials. We hope that some of the athletes who will reach an age when they are allowed to compete next year might be able to join us – unless we can arrange a team of 49 athletes to fill the bus!
Having so many keen and capable people to take part yesterday was a massive advantage. A match in Aberdeen is often a good place to notch up a great result on account of central belt teams failing to travel in numbers. To take your place in Corstorphine’s team, please get in touch with Ally, Ryan, your coach or me (James Harrison). At the moment, we know we will be missing our regular javelin throwers, 110mH hurdler and 400mH hurdlers. These are great opportunities to score well on the day and our success counts upon willing participants in these events.
Full results of Match 2 can be found here.
Tim Norwood is keen to bolster his team for CSSAL at East Kilbride on 30th June. Please get in touch with Tim or your coach if you think you could compete in the events listed for Match 2: hurdles, 200m, 1500m, 4x100m, long jump and shot put.