Colchester Harriers’ Colin Ridley strikes gold while Dominic King qualifies for World Championships
Colchester Harriers' Dominic King, competing in the race-walk at the London Olympics in 2012, has qualified for this summer's World Athletics Championships, which are also being held in London. - Credit: PA
Colchester Harriers’ Colin Ridley kept up his amazing spell of form with a superb gold medal at the Essex 5-mile road race Championships, held from the excellent venue of Gt Leighs racecourse last weekend.
Ridley took the veteran over- 50 gold in a swift time of 28mins 30secs for the five-mile route, not a bad effort considering that he has now reached 55 years of age!
Club-mate Fran Norris took silver in the over-55 female veteran class, thanks to a fine performance. She clocked 37:45.
Fellow Harrier Pete West stopped the clock at 30:06 to show that he is on the comeback trail, winning a bronze medal in the over-50 veteran men’s category.
Other Harriers times included: Ged McMillan 28:36, Craig Mitchell 30:25, Keith Marley 30:25, Tom Cresswell 30:55, David Wright 31:40, Rebecca Cooke 33:50, Simon Morgan 33:38 and Rachel Rodgers 52:07.
Meanwhile, Colchester Harriers’ race-walker, Dominic King, has qualified for the IAAF World Championships, to be held in London this year.
King recorded a superb 50km performance in Dudince, Slovakia, clocking 4hrs 04mins 16secs to finish 13th in the third fastest time of his career. He has a personal best of 3:57.
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King will therefore become the first-ever athlete to complete a hat-trick of major sporting competitions in his own country, after the London Olympics (2012) and the Manchester Commonwealth Games (2002).
Elsewhere, it was a two-times double victory at the Colchester Castle and Mersea Parkruns last weekend.
Ramadan Osman and Amanda Henry were victorious in Colchester, while Richard Flutter and Debbie Cattermole romped to victories at Mersea.
Danny Millward was the winner at the Arrow Park Parkrun near Manchester.
Richard Millward’s hard training, ahead of the Manchester Marathon, was rewarded with a big personal best time of 3:22.04 for the 26.2-mile distance.
And club-mate Malcolm Statham ran his 194th marathon, at Bungay in north Suffolk last weekend. Statham celebrated by clocking his best-ever time at the event, in 3:23.
Wayne Cook ran a good time of 1:25.34 in the supporting Bungay Half-Marathon.
