Herts Phoenix Senior women enjoyed a good result in their second match of 3 in their 2009 UK Women’s league division 4 campaign on Sunday 5th July at Coventry. Despite a few late withdrawals we were still able to field a strong team and finished 2nd out of 8 in the match.

With the final match to go on August 2nd in Gateshead the team are now in a great position to secure promotion to Division 3. This will of course depend very much on whether enough athletes are available to make the long journey to the North East.
 
        Match 2 Result                                            League Positions          
1    COV           8    233.0                             1    HERTS P     15    399.0                      
2    HERTS P     7    216.0                             2    COV           13    396.0                      
3    HHH            6    215.5                             3    READING    11    372.5                      
4    READING    5    200.0                             4    LEEDS        11    361.5                      
5    LEEDS        4    186.0                             5    HHH              8    341.5                      
6    AFD            3    148.0                             6    GATES      5.5    281.0                      
7    GATES       2    147.0                             7    CI               4.5    249.5                      
8    CI                1    115.5                             8    AFD              4    238.0                 

COV – Coventry Godiva Harriers
Herts P – Herts Phoenix AC
Reading AC
Leeds - Leeds City AC
HHH – Herne Hill Harriers
Gates – Gateshead Harriers
CI – Channel Islands
AFD – Aldershot Farnham and District

The match started in the field with the Long Jump, Hammer and Pole Vault .In this match the team did not have a pole vaulter so no points were gained in that event. In the Hammer both Eve Miller and Loren Scanes threw well, although slightly below their personal bests from a few weeks ago but still achieved good results with Loren coming 5th in the A string with 35.05 and Eve winning the B string competition with 34.45. In the long jump, great results were achieved by Lauren Thompson and Kathi Streatfield. Lauren was returning to this event after a year’s absence due to injury and showed her old form and potential by jumping 5.29 to win the A string. Kathi gained second place in the B string with 4.98.

The track started with the 400 Hurdles race where Herts Phoenix women secured first and second places. Laura Jones easily won the A string race in a time of 65.1 and the ever reliable Rebecca Hore who was a late call up to the team came second in the B string race with a time of 67.1. Both of these times were very close to the girl’s personal bests. Next up was the 800 where Emma Kavanagh just returning from injury ran in an event that she is still not accustomed to, but ran well to achieve a time of 2mins 29.40 to come 7th in her race. Julie Simmons ran in the B string 800 and came 6th in a time of 2.51.0. This was shortly followed by the 100 m sprint where Laura Jones came 7th in the A string in a time of 12.9 which is equal to her personal best and Lauren Thompson continued having a great match by coming  4th in the B string with a new personal best time of 12.7. Meanwhile in the High jump, Hayley Kruse came second by clearing a height of 1.60 which is equal to her personal best and only narrowly missed first place on count back. In the B string Kathi Streatfield who featured in all 3 jumps events came 5th with a height of 1.30 before she had to rush off to her favoured event of Triple Jump.

Next followed the 400 where Deborah Willis returning from injury came 6th in the A string with a time of 60.5 and Rebecca Hore had another good race to gain valuable points by securing another second place with a new personal best time of 62.3. Over in the Discus Peta Lundgren threw 27.22 to come 7th in the A string and Hammer thrower Loren Scanes came 2nd in the B string with 26.29 a distance which is very close to her personal best. In the Triple jump good points were achieved for the team.  Kathi Streatfield showed some good form by coming second in the A string with 11.50 and Danielle Currie also came second in the B string competition.

Next in the 100 Hurdles race, Claire Humphries competing her first match of the season for the club ran well and showed her good recent form from Regional and National championships to achieve a time of 14.7 which is very close to her PB to come 2nd in the A string and Lauren Thompson made it 3 great results for her and the team to win the B string with a time of 15.6 which again was very closed to her PB. In the 3000 it was great to see GB international Steeple chaser on her return from injury competing again for the club. Lizzy came 3rd in the A string with a time of 10.17.0 and in the B string Natasha Taylor who is having a great season slashed another 9 seconds of her PB to come 3rd in the B string in a time of 10.40.0.   In the 1500, Charlotte Davies ran well to come 6th in the A string with 4.55.6 and Julie Simmons was 6th in the B string with 5.51.7 which is a new personal best in this event for her.

The shot competition saw Peta Lundgren 5th in the A string with 9.87 and in the B string, Hayley Kruse was 4th with a putt of 8.90. Next on the track was the 200 where Laura Jones was 7th in the A string with a time of 27.0 and Deborah Willis was 5th in the B string with a time of 27.4

In the Javelin, Peta Lundgren was second with a throw of 38.70 and Katie Grehan won the B string with a throw of 35.69. A fifth place followed in the 4 x 100 from the squad of Jones, Thompson, Streatfield and Humphries and with nobody available for the 2000m Steeple Chase the match finished with a 3rd place in the 4 x 400 from the squad of Willis, Davies, Kavanagh and Jones.

Ian Burrows – Womens Team Manager