There are a number of North East Counties Athletics Association (NECAA) Championship races over the course of the year and the famous Signals Road Relays Championship is one of the highlights of the north east athletics season. It consists of a 4 leg race for the ladies/V50+ men and a 6 leg race for the senior/under 50 men. The races used to be held in the Team Valley but with British authorities seemingly incapable of, if only once in a blue moon, prioritising runners over motorists/shoppers the races moved, several years ago, to the road cycling track that encircles the lake at Hetton Lyons Country Park in Houghton-Le-Spring. It’s a 2 x 1.1mile undulating loop that provides a tough test with ample space for over 160 teams in total!
We had a great turn out with 5 teams competing in the first race – the Women’s / V50+ Mens and 3 teams competing in second race, the Senior/V40+ men.
Our ladies Vets (>35’s) team: Hazel Bough, Felicity Smith, Louise Allen and Justina Heslop had a tremendous performance taking second place a narrow 50 seconds behind Sunderland Strollers and, with them, some rather nice silver NECAA medals. Congrats to Justina who ran the fastest Vet leg of the day, beating multiple Olympian Aly Dixon by 2 seconds in 12.45.
Our second ladies Vets team: Debbie Spoor, Joanne Webber, Su-wan Lewis and Jayne Cuskern also had an impressive run finishing in 20th place out of 35 teams.
Our senior women’s team featured Poppy Wilde (making her senior team debut) followed by Kisi Hardman, Imogen King and Rachel Dodds. Again the ladies had a solid race finishing 15th in a field of 30 teams. Special mention for Poppy whose time of 13.43 put her in the top 15 senior female runners, brilliant at age 15!
With a proud history to maintain, our first V50 men’s team were happy to take 3rd place being only 12 seconds behind NSP in 2nd and 26 seconds behind winners Crook. Special mention for James Douglas who ran the 2nd fastest V50 leg of the day. Shame Mark Turnbull, Jason Old and Mike Russell had left him just a bit too much to do to secure the win, despite his very best efforts!
Our second V50 men: Iain Hardy, Roland Brown, John Rippon and Simon Allen ran very impressive legs, finishing 8th out of 29 teams. Had Simon not pulled his achilles on the last hill they might well have been a couple of places higher still! Good luck Simon with your recovery ahead of London.
In the second race, the Elswick blokes did us all proud with a mix of youth and experience delivery some very impressive and encouraging performances.
First home was the team of Danny Spoor. Steve Horn, David Bell, Callum Eldridge, Jonny Rewcastle and Luke Hilliard. This impressive sextet, with less than 30 seconds separating their leg times, were 12th home out of 50 teams.
Next, in 22nd place, was the team of Scott Brady, Chris Mason, Dave Jones, Charlie K-W, Stephen Dobson and Paul Taylor. Special mention to (relative) youngsters Chris, Charlie and Stephen who ran very well in, what I think, were their first Signal Relays.
In 36th place was the team featuring father & son, Paul and Adam Robinson, Aiden Jones, Lee Coulson, Eric Lewis & Rob Lambert. Special mention to Adam and Aiden who, I believe, were making their senior debuts in the Signals and ran the team’s two fastest legs.
Full results are available on the FB page.
30 years of racing but never had ‘avoid the llamas’ announced on the start line before!
Mike Russell
