Wallasey Athletic Club's Adele Gibbon won the intermediate ladies shot competition with a personal best of over 8 metres at Chester and later went on to complete a notable double when forming one quarter of the successful 4 x 100 metres relay squad in the same age group, assisted by Joanne Johnson, Leisel Phillips and Emma Derwent.
Emma Derwent finished second in the 400 metres in a time of 65.4 seconds. The runners-up berth was also filled by Paula Simpson in the under-13 girls 800 metres , in a time of 2 minutes 39 seconds. In the same event at junior ladies level, Collette Winstanley finished third, recording 2 minutes 35 seconds.
Of the athletes who performed well were Claire Jones and Diane Senogles who finished fifth and sixth respectively in the under-13 long jump and Sarah Graves who narrowly missed qualifying for the 800 metres final.
Meanwhile, Wallasey's relay teams have been kept busy in the Cheshire Relay Championship staged at Crewe and Hartford. Pride of place here goes to the under-13 girls 3x800 metres team of Paula Simpson, Diane Senogles and Sarah Graves who exceeded all expectations when battling their way to third place against some stiff opposition. The same spot was also filled by the intermediate ladies 4 x 100 metres team which was victorious at Chester.
Wallasey men's relay teams have had mixed fortunes. On the bright side the 4 x 400 metres squad of Keith Simpson, Dave Pendleton, Dave Walton and Steve Moores provided an epic finale at Wigan, needing to finish in front of Stretford to finish in fifth position in the Northern League.
The race was made more dramatic by the fact that the two teams were virtually together from the gun, but eventually Wallasey proved to be just the stronger. However, the same quartet of athletes ran at Crewe and while taking credit in qualifying for the final, were outclassed by some strong opposition.
At Hartford the 4 x 100 metres squad of Keith Simpson, Steve Moores, Phil Smith and Dave Pendleton finished sixth in the final. At 800 metres the 'A' team of Simpson, Moores, Pendleton and Bob Brimage finished 7th and the 'B' team eighth this consisted of Robin Jones, Malcolm Hardcastle, Rob McWilliam and James Downey.
At individual level there was a superb run by Robin Jones at Wigan in the 5000 metres, finishing second in 15 minutes 13 seconds.
Ends
Source - Wallasey News - Wednesday, 29/07/1987
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