The senior women and U15 girls of Herts Phoenix travelled to Radley AC in Abingdon for their penultimate match, knowing that only a win would keep them in with a chance of retaining the title they have won for the last two years in the final match at Colchester in three weeks time.

Taking on the hosts Radley, Dacorum and Tring and Ashford AC, things did not start well when their coach was delayed by an hour with the team sitting in a queue behind a nasty accident on the M25 prompting the meeting organisers to delay all the events by half an hour.  Despite this the athletes were out of the blocks fast, knowing that they had to perform well on a day with perfect conditions for good athletics.

Natalie Farman in the Senior women led the way with a total of 6 victories to her name in the A string High Jump and Long Jump (with a personal best of 5.29m), and B string Shot Putt (another PB of 9.56m), 400mHurdles and 100mHurdles plus running a fine leg in the winning 4x100m relay.  Laura Jones also put in some sterling performances for the team, winning the A string Javelin and Shot Putt and 2nd in the Hammer with a new pb of 20.56m and winning the B string 200m and taking 3rd place in the Discus. Eve Miller partnered Laura in the Hammer and took good points with second in the B string.

Elsewhere, there were several fine performances with Natasha Taylor winning the A string 1500m and taking a very close second in the 3000m both in new personal best times of 5.03.7s and 11.08.6s respectively.

Birthday girl Rebecca Hore, taking on the 400mHurdles for the first time recorded a fantastic 2nd place in 73.1s and then went on to take third in the A string Triple Jump.
Her training partner Hannah Lloyd recorded new personal bests in winning the  300mHurdles in 45.8s and taking an excellent 2nd in the 400m – her first time at the distance outdoors – in 59.5s.  She was partnered by Steph Sattin who won the B string in 60.5s despite being hampered by a foot injury.

In the 800m Chloe-Anne Currie won the B string with Laura Whitehead taking 3rd in the A string and Chloe then went on to take 3rd in the Triple Jump.

In the sprints Claire Humphries had a good day taking a close 2nd in the 100m in 12.7s to equal her pb, partnered by training partner Steph Gaynor who won the B string in 12.8s, a new pb.  Claire then went on to take 1st places in the A string 200m in a new pb of 25.9s and the 80mHurdles and Steph won the 100m hurdles comfortably to make it a hurdles double.

Also racking up good points was Millie Phelan – showing her heptathlon versatility in winning the B string High Jump and Long jump (with a new pb of 5.13m) and taking second in the 80mHurdles.

Eloise Meakins added a first place in the B string Javelin with 36.35m and 3rd in the 3000m.

Both the relay teams recorded wins, with the 4x100m team of Phelan, Farman, Lloyd and Humphries winning comfortably and the 4x400m team of Gaynor, Hore, Whitehead and Jones winning a close and exciting race with Laura Jones showing all her strength and experience to hold off the Radley athlete in the last 10 metres.

The U15 girls, with only 8 athletes performed exceptionally well with Sprinters Jodie Williams and Isabella Cacciatore recording double wins in the 100m and a first and second in the 200m.  In the 800m Ella Lloyd and Cacciatore teamed up to gain two second places and in the 1500m Katie Burr and Hannah Nolan recorded 3rd and 2nd places in A and B string respectively.  Hurdlers Natasha Hadley and Sacha Dowling took 2nd and 3rd places and in the field events Natasha and Sacha took two second places in the Long Jump – Natasha recording a new pb of 4.91m.

Two more second places were secured in the Shot Putt by Melissa Hadley and Katie Burr – both with personal bests of 8.97m and 6.59m respectively. Melissa and Hannah Nolan also collected good points in the Discus as did Natasha Hadley and Ella Lloyd – with a new pb of 1.10m – in the High Jump. The 4x100m relay team of Natasha Hadley, Cacciatore, Nolan and Williams comfortably took their final race of the day to round off an excellent day for the club.

The final standings were therefore

Herts Phoenix AC   177 points
Radley AC               160.5
Dacorum and Tring  158.5

Unfortunately Ashford AC did not attend the meeting which will mean that the three clubs present will all be docked 10 points.  This will mean that Herts Phoenix will go into the final match on 30th August in third place in the League needing a big win whilst waiting to hear the results from other matches to see if they can retain their title.  This will provide an exciting end to the season and require team managers Ian Burrows and Lisa Currie to have their calculators at the ready to see if the team can win the league for the third time in a row.

Jon Humphries
Herts Phoenix AC