Central Park, Dartford Friday July 29, 2022
Wole Odele was the sole Cambridge winner in our final vets league match at Dartford, moving from 2nd to 1st with his final effort of 9.86m in the M50 Triple Jump, after a final switch from the 7m board to the 9m board. Wole had earlier placed 2nd in the M50 100m. There were also gutsy 2nd place finishes for Neb Jovanovic, James Macdonald and Paris Hunt in the M35 3000m (A & B String) and M60 Triple Jump, respectively.
The 100m was the first event on the track and Neb used this as the warm-up for his subsequent 3000m race, finishing in a PB of 13.4s in the A-string race, despite an off-balance standing start, whilst Paris dropped down a few age-groups to set a new PB of 13.5s for the B-string.
Another athlete getting a PB was Ian McCarthy who was dropping down a few age-groups to help secure a point in the M35 Triple Jump. After a foul in the first round, Ian just got into the pit on his second effort and improved on that with a final jump and PB of 5.26m.
The M35 3000m was run as a combined race with James Macdonald amongst the early leaders and Neb a few paces behind. Neb picked up the pace on the final lap and was going for a win but just lost out by 0.6s to the Medway winner. James also finished 2nd in the B-string race.
Christian Poulton and Martin Hawkins both secured 4th in the M50 and M60 3000m races.
In the field, Peter Wishart and Michael Pape both dropped down age-groups to come 4th and 5th in the M50 and M35 shot, respectively.
The team finished in a disappointing 5th position on the night, but 4th overall for the season, bolstered by our strong points from the previous matches to remain in Division 1 of the Kent vets league for next season.
Massive thanks to the officials including the Cambridge trio of Barry Ferguson, Phil Pape and Richard Mann for helping to make it all happen.
Results
Pictures courtesy of Holly Dixon