Hercules Wimbledon AC round-up: Fast times posted by home runners in 5,000m race

As the track season comes to a close, Hercules Wimbledon Athletic Club seized some of their final opportunities for fast times at the Hercules 5,000m night, held on their Wimbledon Park home track on Saturday, writes George Mallett.

Jonathan Cornish jumped one place higher to seventh on the club’s all-time 5,000m list, thanks to a hugely impressive 14:06.18 clocking. It took six seconds off his previous best mark, overtaking sixth place on that list, Andrew Penney, over the final lap.

Cornish finished ninth in the elite race, won by Welshman Dafydd Jones in 13:53.50. Penney was 11th in 14:09.64, a good return after a month of, more or less, no running. Toby Cooke was the third Hercules representative in that race, finishing 18th in 14:22.44, good enough for 13th on the all-time list.

In the B race, Charlie Eastaugh kept up an incredible streak as he ran 14:27.24 for eighth. Eastaugh has improved his previous best mark in each of his appearances over 5,000m and duly took one more second as he closed hard over the final 400m, It sees him move one place higher on the all-time list to 17th.

George Mallett and Henry Silverstein appeared in the D race, running 15:10.08 and 15:20.84 respectively to finish seventh and 13th.

Tom Drayton improved his personal best by two seconds to finish seventh in the E race, running 15:33.35. Likewise in the F race Jack Hobden bettered his previous best by six seconds to clock 15:46.13, good enough for second.

There was similar success for Joe Clark in the G race, finishing second in 16:09.60 and Matt de Freitas won the second race of the evening. De Freitas’s time of 16:50.50 is a new V55 club record, and the second fastest by any in his age group this year.

At the British Master Athletics Federation Track & Field Championships in Derby on the weekend of 26-28 July, several Hercules athletes took British titles for their age group.

Mark Andrews, competing in the V35 class, took both triple jump and discus gold as well as high jump silver and weight throw bronze. Andrews jumped 10.97m for his third round in the triple, finishing 10cm clear of Matthew Smith. It was good enough for fifth in all the age groups competing that day.

It was a similarly close affair in the discus, where just 26cm separated him from runner-up Chris Mee, Andrews throwing 30.50m, again in round three of six. It was sixth of all the day’s age groups. Andrew went on to clear 1.55m in the high jump and throw 8.75m in the weight throw.

Matt De Freitas continued his strong season to run 4:28.04 for a brilliant V55 bronze, a time good enough for fourth in his age group’s rankings for the whole of 2024. It was also a V55 club record, just a week before his 5,000m mark. He would also break the 800m best in finishing fourth, running 2:13.99.

Anna Garnier took W65 silver in both the 1500m and 800m, running 5:56.07 and 2:55.67s respectively. Both marks are the second quickest for her age group in the UK this year.