7 Golds, 3 Silvers and 3 Bronzes – British Masters National Championships

Two days of action from the British Masters Championships saw Bristol & West run away with a bag full of medals!

Following on from recent years, the 1,500m remained a distance full of rich pickings for the Club. We had two athletes successfully retaining their titles from last year as Dave Bedwell picked up the Gold in a fiercely contested M60 Category, and Sarah Everitt in the W50. As with last year Sarah was followed home by Clare Jolliffe. Clare’s Silver was a testament to the recent Treatment that she has received from Monika at the Bristol chiropractic clinic, three months ago it was pretty painful jogging let alone running.

Although not medalling in the M50 1,500m, Tony Roper was rewarded with a splendid new (Veteran Era) PB of 4:42.48. It’s a great time to be running fast when moving up an age category in time for the World Masters Championships. Worth noting that if Tony was born one day earlier, he could have been celebrating being the M55 Champion! Tony also chose to miss out on the M55 5,000m Silver medal on his Birthday. In preparation for the World Masters Tony opted to run in the faster M50 race again recording another Masters era PB of 17:12.59 – Looking forward, there will be plenty of medal winning opportunities to come.

The 1,500m was always going to be a hard act to follow but Sunday’s 800m races did throw up some good Championship races. Sarah Everitt had what could only be described as a comfortable win, taking the race from the gun and winning with ease. On the flip side, Pete Mountain was made to work hard for his Bronze medal in the M60, when all three medals were decided by less than three tenths of a second. Dave Bedwell chased hard in 4^th place but just failed to get amongst the medals. Anne Dockery was making her debut at the event in the W70 and walked away with a Silver medal.

In the field, Andrew Thomas M45 threw 36.21m in the Discus to secure Silver missing out on Gold by just 11cms! Meanwhile Sasha Spottiswoode was making her mark in readiness for the World Masters Championships, she got a Bronze medal with her javelin throw of 21.88m. Maria Townsend W35 was extremely busy competing in the Long Jump to come 4^th, the javelin to come 4^thagain and then secured a bronze in the shot put throwing 8.74m.

In the sprints races it was Bristol & West Ladies that impressed, Carol Powell W60 dominated her races, winning the 100m, 200m and 400m (a championship record) easily. This was even more impressive as she will move up an age group in December. Anne Doherty W70 also made her debut in the sprints and took gold in 400m. Yours truly W45, raced in the 100m and 200m with solid performances (she did not come last) and got great experience from competing at such a level.

Report by Dave Taylor and Hen Anstey

Table of Field results below

Table of Track results below