Herne Hill Harriers Ore Adamson became National indoor under 15 girls long jump champion at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield last Saturday as she leapt to a gold medal in the England Athletics Age Group Indoor Championship. Ore’s winning margin of 29cm was a significant one and the best of her six jump series at 5.69m was the third longest ever for a British under 15 girl indoors. Ore is an exceptional talent who is showing great promise for an exciting outdoor season this summer.
In cross country action Harriers under 13 boys and combined under 15 boys/under 17 men’s teams both emerged as winners at the male Surrey League races on Wimbledon Common, while in the female races in Richmond Park the under 17 girls team claimed an on the day victory. In the overall standings for the four races of the league season, the two boys teams took the league titles and also the under 13 girls’ team were winners of their league despite only placing third team in the final race this weekend. Harriers’ under 15 girls and under 17 women both ended their seasons placed as third teams overall. The only individual winner from Herne Hill across all of the age groups was Zoe Tompkins who was first U17 woman to finish in a race combined with the under 15 girls.
In the senior races the Herne Hill women followed up our recent South of England bronze team medals with another excellent third place in the final league fixture, with a score that was only three points shy of second place and eleven behind the winners. The team was led home by Cathy Ansell, making a welcome return in her first cross country race for almost a year in a remarkable third place in Division 1, backed up well by Herne Hill debutante Hayley Munn in seventh and the ever improving Annes Stevens in twenty-first. Our women placed sixth overall in the league over the four races.
Although Herne Hill’s men’s team enjoyed a good turnout in numbers, the club were only able to finish sixth of nine teams in Division 1 on the day. But this perfomance was enough to ensure we ended the season fourtth overall in the league, with Alan Barnes yet again leading the team, placing eleventh of 182 finishers, but he had Rich Henderson for company for almost all of the race as he showed he is getting back to race fitness in sixteenth.