Wells City Harriers dominated the Glastonbury Round the Tor races this past weekend (May 4th) where almost 40 of the Club members were out competing.  Nathan Young once again won the main event with a convincing run over the 10km distance, following up on his victory from last year. Meanwhile another squad of Harriers were competing in a team relay in North Dorset.

In the main Round the Tor 10k race, the Club’s strength in depth was shown when Harriers occupied all of the first four finishing places. Nathan Young swept home in 32.47, with younger brother Kieran 2^nd in 34.39, and then Tom Dukes 3^rd in 35.35 just ahead of 4th placed and 1^st u20 athlete Philip Bridge with his 35.56.

Other notable top 20 performances were by u17 athlete James Williams in 37.29 just ahead of the Club’s Wells Fun Run Director Andrew Deamer, 2^nd V40 in 37.36. In the 5km race school Year 9 Harrier Alex Williams was an excellent 3^rd place in a nippy time of 18.54 and year 8 Kieran Ensor was 16^th in 20.55. Megan Rusca was first u17 girl with her time of 22.22. In the 3km race Dylan Dukes was 3^rd in 11.25.  More results and reporting to follow....

Many of these athletes will now be looking forward to the Wells Fun Runs to be held on Sunday May 25^th. Entry forms and details are in the panel to the right.

Meanwhile at the North Dorset Villages Marathon on Sunday the Harriers had two teams of four competing in the relay version of the event and both finished inside the top ten teams, out of 35 teams. The 26.2 mile course around the undulating roads of the area takes the competitors through many of the pretty villages on narrow lanes. Conditions were hot for the full marathon distance runners and only 9 runners out of the 350 entered in the full version managed to run inside 3 hours.

For the Harrier teams they could afford to put in a more speedy effort on the shorter races. On leg 1 covering 11.6km Nathan Baker ran an excellent 46.12 whilst Dave Purchase ran 46.59 guesting for the Club to cover for Neil Biss who was still recovering from a bug. On leg 2 over, 7.2km Sam Baker ran 33.52 whilst Jill Harrison overtook Sam when running a nippy 30.29. On leg 3 Paul Chadwick took over the baton for the Baker team covering 12.4km in 55.25 and Tony Watts ran 55.45 to keep that team ahead. The glory leg saw Charlotte Baker run an excellent 45.59 for the 11km distance whilst Tim Hawkins hit his stride with a 38.34 clocking to bring his team home in 7^th place overall, 2^nd mixed team with a combined time of 2hours 51mins for the marathon distance whilst the Baker team & Paul were 10^th with a total time of 3.01.

Club members are reminded that the County Track & Field Championships take place on the weekend of May 18^th & 19^th at Yeovil Arena. The Harriers anticipate that some 20+ or so of its members aged 11 upwards will compete as part of the joint Yeovil Olympiads team at this event. Full programe available on : http://www.somerset-athletics.co.uk/trackandfieldmainpage.htm