Weekend Roundup  13, 14 & 15 June

Some magnificent relay action and a string of personal bests were the feature of Central AC athletes at the Bank of Scotland Under 23/Under 20 and Junior distance Relay Championships at Grangemouth Stadium.

Scott McDonald made it gold with a his win in the U20 5000metres with a new personal best of 15min 04.05secs, whilst Jennifer Hutchison took silver in the under 20 400metre Hurdles with a new best time of  66.51s.  It was silver again for Alex Hendry as he took the under 20 steeplechase, this time lowering his best time to 6:20.95s. Fiona Thompson took the Under 23 gold title for the 1500metres with a time of 4min 38.21secs, just four hundredth of a second outside her personal best. The almost clean sweep of personal bests was more remarkable due to heavy competition load from the previous day's Schools Championships for Alex and Jennifer.

A magnificent team effort by the under 13 girl trio of Roisin Bonnuchi, Emily Greenan and Kathryn Gillespie led to a Scottish Championship title in the 3 x 800m relays. Qualification for the final was achieved in good style with final runner Kathryn Gillespie given the luxury of a comfortable jog on her leg after great running by her team-mates as they achieved third qualifying spot in their heat. The final was another story. Roisin and Emily kept Central firmly in contention with Emily handing the baton over to Kathryn some 25 metres off the gold medal position, where she quickly worked up the field to joint the leading trio of runners.  The last 200 metres saw Kathryn take, then lose, but then regain the lead to Myrtle Brekenridge of Shettleston in one of the finishes of the day with a final time of 7:55.84s.

In the under 13 boys race Central's trio of Andrew McNally, Philip Wright and Dominic Angiolini were unlucky not the get through to the final being next in line in the fastest loser category as they finished fourth in their heat with 8 minutes 15s.

The Under 15 boys featured two Central teams in the final, after a rather meaningless set of heats to drop just one team for the final. The end result of silver medal place and fifth place was a great achievement with Central's A team of Ross Milne, Martin Hall and Tom Watson running a series of great times with 6:37.61s but were no match on the day to a trio from Giffnock who broke the Scottish record, whilst the B team of Gordon Milne, Kieran Everden and Roddy Irvine had a series of fierce tussles in the main field as they came home for fifth in 6:53.07s.

The Vale of Leven 10K, held on Sunday 15 June, was the fourth Race in the Stewarts Scottish Road Race Grand Prix and saw Central’s Alison Docherty come home in third place with another well judged run, finishing in 36min 44secs to push her well ahead in the overall Series.  Ross Houston was Central’s top male athlete in sixth with another strong run to finish in 31min 37secs, again well to the fore in the overall Series.  David Armour rolled back the years with a 34.51 clocking in 29^th and Lewis Millar finished 31^st with 35min 12secs.

The British Milers Club races in Watford on the evening of Saturday 14 June saw Alastair Hay leaving his opposition in his wake as he clocked an excellent 3min 49.46secs.

The Scottish Schools Track and Field Championships were held at Grangemouth on Friday and Saturday 13^th and 14^th June making it a busy weekend for many Central junior athletes.  Kyle Henderson proved to be the class in the 15 to 16 years age group to win the Long Jump with a 6.39metre effort.  Kyle also ran 23.94secs in the heat of the 200metres but this wasn’t sufficient to see him progress to the Final.  Sophie Brown also showed good form to win the Under 14 High Jump with a 1.45 metre clearance and produced a 28.73secs effort in her 200metre heat.  Jennifer Hutchison brought home a Silver medal from the Over 16 400metres hurdles with a fine 67.67secs effort and finished fourth in the 400metres with 59.84secs.  Tom Watson also weighed in with a Silver medal effort in the 14 to 15 Age Group, reducing his 800metre personal best in the process to 2min 3.72secs.  Tom also ran in the 1500metres but had to settle for fifth place with 4min 30.49secs, no surprises with his fourth race in two days.  Alex Hendry was operating in the Over 16 Age Group and won Silver in the 2000metre Steeplechase in a tasty 6min 24.95secs.  Neil Cameron rounded off the medal positions taking Bronze in the Under 14 Long Jump with a best of 4.52metres,   Neil just missed out on a second Bronze finishing fourth in the Triple Jump with 9.58metres.

Andrew Butchart and Scott Green both ran well in the 15 to 16 years 3000metres with places/times of 4^th in 8min 57.42secs and 6^th in 9min 5.17secs, the two boys also contested the 1500metres finishing with best times of 4min 18.85secs and 4min 22.64secs respectively, Andrew having progressed to the final where he finished sixth.  In the 14 to 15 age group Ross Milne again showed some determined running to ensure a place in the final of the 800metres where he finished sixth and posted a best time of 2min 10.3secs.  Gordon Milne was competing in the Under 14 age group and although not progressing to the final here still ran a useful 2min 21.98secs.  Rachel Adamson (2min 40.15secs) and Julie Cook (2min 41.44secs) contested the 14 to 15 age group 800metres but neither progressed to the final on this occasion.  Rosie Hastings made her effort in the 15 to 16 years 1500metres finishing just outside her personal best with 5min 21.85secs.  Lorna Cameron was also running in this age group and although running 2min 22.97secs in her heat of the 800metres missed out on a final spot by the narrowest of margins.  Lorna went on to finish fifth in the final of the Triple Jump with a best effort of 9.65metres.  Sarah Dick competed in the 14 to 15 years age group and finished with times of 13.90 for 100metres and 28.80 for 200metres.  Katie-Mairi King tackled the 80metres hurdles in the 15 to 16 age group finishing eighth with 14.63secs and then producing a 4.01metre Long Jump effort.  David Scott competed over 100metres in the same age group, finishing in 13.09secs, just outside the qualifying time for the final.

21 and 22 June

Ross Houston proved to be Central’s athlete of the weekend by winning the prestigious East Kilbride Half Marathon from a high quality field, returning an excellent 70min 16secs clocking. 

Lewis Millar finished a highly respectable third in the Falkland Hill Race in a time of 21min 24secs, the race held over three miles with 1200 feet of climbing.

The Scottish Masters Championships at Pitreavie, Dunfermline saw Frank Houston achieving the best High Jump clearance of the day to take Gold with a leap of 1.68metres and following this up with a Long Jump of 5.34metres.  Alex Milne also took Gold in the M40 1500metres with 4min 37.72secs and Bronze in the 800metres with a 2min 13.52secs effort.  Robert Hutchison found himself in a tasty race in the M45 800metres and had to settle for fourth although running an excellent 2min 13.34secs then found some compensation with a Bronze medal in the 1500metres, finishing in 4min 43.07secs.

Central Athletic Club were well represented in the gruelling West Highland Way Race, which started at 1 am on Saturday 21 June from Milngavie.  The race takes in the full length of the West Highland Way from Milngavie to Fort William and saw four of Central’s ultra-distance runners taking up the annual 95 mile Challenge.  Central’s contingent consisted of Jim Drummond, a veteran of many West Highland Way races, Alan Gall attempting this challenge for the first time, the evergreen Roger Greenaway and Hugh Kerr who was looking to improve on his first attempt a year ago.  Hugh came home first of the Central contingent in a most impressive 20 hours 20 minutes finishing in a highly creditable 12th place overall and a full two hours quicker than in 2007.  Roger Greenaway finished in 24 hours 40 minutes with Jim Drummond completing the race yet again.  Alan Gall also showed great spirit but was forced to retire on medical advice after completing 81 miles.

Men’s League Match 3 – 29 June 2008

Central Athletic Club’s Mens Team completed the third Match in Division 1 of the Scottish Athletic League with yet another second place, a result hewn out of a tremendous Team effort with some outstanding individual performances.

Perhaps the individual performance of the day was down to Under 17 Gregor MacLean, the young man making light of the blustery conditions to improve his Pole Vault personal best no less than five times to finish with a Scottish Age Group Record and a qualifying height for the Commonwealth Youth Games of 4.40metres.  Not to be outdone, 15 year old local athlete Kyle Henderson set a new personal Outdoor best of 1.90metres in winning the High Jump and lowering his 100metres best to 11.3secs into a 1.3metre headwind while winning the ‘B’ event.  It would also have been easy to elect Robert Russell as the top Central athlete of the day.  Robert started with third place in the 800metres (2min 1.3secs – a good performance in the windy conditions) then really got into his stride as he next won the 1500metres in 4min 8.4secs and swept to a majestic victory in the 5000metres (15min 8.4secs).  Robert didn’t finish there but teamed up with Ian McDonald, Alex Hendry and Lewis Millar in the 4 x 400metres relay with the team finishing sixth in 3min 47secs.

Gary Sweeney has proven to be a mainstay of the Team in recent years and here made a fine contribution in the Throws – fourth in the Hammer (31.05metres) was followed by victory in the Shot Put (11.56metres) then third in the Javelin (37.29metres) before rounding off his throwing with third in the Discus (35.33metres).  Again not quite satisfied with this Gary teamed up with Alasdair Beaton, Kenneth Nicholson and Kyle Henderson to record a superb second place in the 4 x 100metre relay to record 46.6secs.  Kenny Pearson weighed into the Throws with another set of fine performances including fourth ‘B’ in the Shot Put (8.70metres) then third ‘B’ in the Javelin (33.33metres) and second ‘B’ in the Discus (25.33metres).

Alasdair Beaton underlined his worth to the Team with some fine sprinting to come home fifth in the 100metes in 11.6secs into a 2.4metre headwind then recording 23.1secs for fourth in the 200metres.  Newcomer Kenneth Nicholson ran a tasty 11.9secs to win the Guest 100metres and Ian McDonald showed good form to come home third in the ‘B’ 200metres recording 23.7secs.  Jamie Hannah again produced a useful run in the 400metres to record 52.5secs in finishing fifth in the ‘A’ race then cleared 1.80metres for second in the ‘B; High Jump and leapt out to 5.42metres for sixth in the Long Jump.  Kenneth Nicholson finished fifth in the ‘B’ Long Jump with 4.98metres.

Alex Hendry showed true team spirit in tackling the 400metres hurdles (sixth in 70.3secs) and 1500metres – first ‘B’ with 4min 22.2secs.  This was also the case with Robert Hutchison as he recorded an excellent fifth ‘B’ placing in the 800metres (2min 15.8secs).  Lewis Millar had to make a dash to the Stadium after a car breakdown but this seemed to have little effect on a great performance to record first ‘B’ placing in the 5000metres (16min 22.2secs).  Central continue to sit second overall in the League 3 points behind Arbroath and District.