Herne Hill Harriers: Julia Wedmore heroically fill vacant slots in latest NAL fixture in Bournemouth

Herne Hill Harriers finished seventh out of the eight teams competing in round three of the National Athletics League at Bournemouth on Saturday, writes Geoff Jerwood.

A common theme this season has been empty spaces on the team sheet, especially in the more technical events such as the hurdles and field events, and this was again where the side suffered with insufficient points on the board overall.

Julia Wedmore’s contribution was immense, as in addition to running close to her season’s best for the 3,000m with 10:51.62 for second in the B string, she also filled four of what she called “completely rogue events” -the 400m hurdles (a PB by around 10 seconds), javelin, 400m and shot.

One of the best individual performances was Georgie Grgec’s runaway solo win in the 3,000m against  three strong opponents.

Grgec sat in for the first 500m and then upped the pace and romped home in 9:35.72 for an impressive victory on a windy day.

Fiona de Mauny won the B string 800m in 2:25.91 and then ran straight over to throw the javelin. Zoe Tompkins travelled down from York and came second in a very competitive A string 800m and then ran a PB in her 400m race not long afterwards. She shaved three hundredths from her previous best but was still excruciatingly just outside 60 seconds (60.08).

Sarah Grover hit the front of her 1,500m after a slow early pace and it was enough to beat all bar one as she finished second A string in 4:49.97. She then even produced a very dominant win in the 2,000m steeplechase by a huge margin of more than a minute to lap almost the entire field, clocking 7:43.59. Grace Leyland placed second in the B 1,500m in 5:11.60.

The men’s middle distance races featured a PB for Daniel Shaw with 1:59.03 for fifth in the A string. As with Tompkins’ 400m, the PB was marginal time wise, but was worth faster in more benign weather.

Shaw then ran well in a tactical 1,500m race to place second in the B string with another strong finish in 4:10.20.

Keeran Sriskandarajah has yet to reach his 16th birthday, but he handled the tactical 1,500m very well to come away with fifth in the A string and a PB of 4:08.87, a time which he can expect to improve in a different sort of race. He later ran a superb opening leg split of 51.5 in the 4x400m relay which set the team up for an exciting battle with Liverpool and Basingstoke.

In an exciting finale Sriskandarajah, Tyson Oladokun (50.0), Adam Thompson (49.5).and Isaac Ogunlade (49.2) finished a fighting second place.

The women’s 4x400m was also thrilling, with three teams swapping the lead. The Herne Hill team, composed of four distance runners, came second. Tompkins ran the first leg in 62.6, then de Mauny in 66.2, before Night of the 10,000m race winner Grgec showed a good turn of shorter distance speed to clock 63.5. Grover was back on the track having only just finished her steeplechase win and she fought all the way for a last leg split of 64.5 split.

The combined U13 and U15 boys and girls placed third out of six teams in the UK Athletics Youth Development League match at Croydon on Sunday.

They are joint first in their table with one match remaining, which will be held on the newly resurfaced Tooting Bec Athletics Track.

As with their senior counterparts, the areas of relative weakness have been in the field events which have been more difficult to train effectively for first of all during the Covid restrictions and then recently during the period in which the club’s home track was closed for a much needed and now completed upgrade.