Congratulations to our club athletes Gareth Fleming and Ellen Kristoffersen who have been selected for the Scottish Schools’ team for the SIAB Pentathlon at the Kelvin Hall on Saturday 3rd December.
Gareth is in the Under 16 Boys’ team, while Ellen will compete in the Over 16 Girls’ event.
Well done and good luck to both athletes.
Open to anyone in the Club wishing to run.
Times of the races are as follows:-
1.00pm – U11 Girls/Boys
1.15pm – U13 Girls/Boys
1.35pm – Sen/Jun/Masters Women & U17 Men
2.10pm – U15Girls/ Boys and U17 Women
2.30pm – Sen/Jun/Vet Men
Open to age groups U13 to Senior. Closing date for entry 26 November 2011. Contact Linda or Kirk Smith before the closing date if you wish to be entered.
U11 to U20 age groups. Linda Smith or Margaret Benham will contact you to advise if selected.
Last weekend saw the thirtieth running of the Midlothian based open cross country event staged by Lasswade Athletic Club at the Gore Glen course which has become so popular with Scottish runners and attracts athletes from all parts of the country. Once again the main sponsor was John Noble (Electrical) Ltd. and again a large entry of class runners turned out for this popular event. The youngest age group was 9 years to 11 years and the first race which was for these potential young stars started at 12.30 on a bright sunny day when the girls race set off over the mile course. In an exciting finish Mairi Wallace of Moorfoot Runners edged ahead of Ishbel Strathdee of Edinburgh and Sarah Calvert of Livingston with the team prize going to Moorfoot’s top three runners. Best for Lasswade were Caroline McKinlay and Demi Cherubini. The under eleven boys event over the same distance was similarly close and resulted in a win by young Jake Gumbrelli of Helensburgh with Stephen Addison of Corstorphine second and Taylor Stewart of Giffnock in third place. The winning team were Airdrie and as well as Fraser Judge in 6th , Lasswade had Craig Gallacher 23rd, Euan McAlister 24th and Euan Donaldson 26th.
In the under 13 girls two mile race Leah Davie (Pitreavie) proved too strong for the opposition who were led by Hilary Lewin (Edinburgh) 2nd. And Regan Binnie (Law and District) 3rd. For the host club Lauren Dickson 6th brought home Rachel Hutchison and Lauren Wilkie to sixth team position. In the same age group for boys Connor Morris (Pitreavie) triumphed over Adam Scott (Fife) and Ross Little (Larkhall) with Ross McKenzie and Lewis Donaldson best for Lasswade.
Eilidh MacCorquodale (Central) won the under 15 girls from Hannah Addison (Corstorphine) and Pamela McNicol (Law) while Sophie Miller was top Midlothian runner. Edinburgh took the first two places in the boys event through Josh Kerr and Robert Bough with Pitreavie’s Aiden Thompson coming in third, just ahead of Lasswade’s Jamie Cousin who lead Iain Lawson and Kyle MacKenzie to second team place. Callum Grahame was the fourth Lasswade runner.
Amy Frankland of the home club was a runaway winner in the under 17 women’s race with the nearest opposition coming from her team-mate Amy Smith. Katie Watson (Edinburgh) was third and the winning Lasswade team was completed by Fiona Matheson supported by Katie Logan. The host club’s Euan Bathgate ran a strong race in a tough under 17 men’s race which was well won by Dundee Hawkhill’s Jamie Crowe from Law’s Andrew Lawler and Ben Potrykus (Pitreavie).
In the final two races over respectively three and three quarter and six miles the Lasswade club’s senior runners came into their own. First of all Temple’s Keira Murray destroyed the opposition in the senior women’s event winning by two and a half minutes from Rowen Bell-Scott and Kate Jenkins and leading the team of Wilma Kerr and Karen McKinlay to third place with Lorna Rice the fourth Lasswade runner.
In the men’s six miles, young Lasswade internationalist Ross Matheson was equally dominant leading from start to finish to win from Corstorphine’s Keith Hood and Robbie Idle of Ireland. The Lasswade team of Matheson, Martin Gore and Ben Mitchell were good winners and club Chairman Brian Wilson ran strongly in support.
Prizes were presented by Councillor Lisa Beattie and councillor and MSP Colin Beattie (who intimated their pleasure at being involved in an enterprise which reflected so well on Midlothian in national terms) and Greg Louden, Lasswade AC Great Britain junior internationalist.
Dave Hand
Lasswade AC
The timetable for the first SAIL meeting on Sunday 13 November 2011 is available by clicking on the link below. Please note that the meeting is scheduled to start at 1.45pm this year.
No Hall on Monday
We have been advised by the Campus that we will not have the hall on Monday 7th November,
All Athletes should report to the track for training starting at 7pm
Anyone wishing to order Club Hoodies can you please contact Heather Fleming at heatherjfleming@aol.com.
Orders for Santa need to be with Heather within the next 10 day to guarentee delivery.
The annual awards dinner was held on Saturday 29th August at the Marriott Hotel in Glasgow. This year Lasswade Athletics Club were nominated for two awards:
Whilst the club was unsuccessful in the Community Club category, it’s great news that Ross was voted the U20 athlete of the year. Ross was up against strong competition in the form of Kirsten McAslan and as you can read from the profiles both are a great credit to Scottish Athletics.
This has been great 30th Anniversary year for the Club with a number of our athletes competing at the highest level. However, this success wouldn’t be possible without the efforts and commitment of all our volunteers, coaches, officials and most importantly all of our young athletes.
Well done everyone and congratulations again to Ross.
As per previous years the Club has been allocated one place for the London Marathon 2012. However next year’s Marathon is even more special given that it’s Olympic Year and this will be the very course that the top athletes in the World will run!! Just think, you could boast that you run the Olympic Marathon Course albeit a few months earlier!
We have decided that if there is more than one person daft enough, I mean motivated enough, to want to take part, we will put the names in a hat and make a draw.
If you are interested please drop me an email at wilsonblack2000@yahoo.co.uk
Best of Luck!!
Brian
The National Cross Country Relays took place in Cumbernauld on Saturday.
The weather was dry, however there was a strong wind and sections of the course were quite muddy from rain earlier in the week. Lasswade had four complete teams competing, one young female, two young male and one complete men’s team (we also had an incomplete men’s team of three).
The first race was the young females and Lauren Dickson had a very good run to finish 18th out of the 65 starters. On our second leg it was Sophie Miller who ran well to hand over in 22nd to Amy Smith. Amy ran a steady race to come home in 18th position.
Next it was the young males race where we had two teams competing. Matthew Smith and Thomas Snodgrass led the teams off with both boys running well to finish 24th and 32nd respectively out of the 74 starters. On our second leg Jamie Cousin took over from Matthew and Callum Graham took over from Thomas. Jamie and Callum ran well with Jamie in 16th place when handing over to Ross Henderson for the final leg and Callum in 48th when handing over to Callum Clark. Ross ran a solid race to finish 22nd and Callum also ran well having just started training again after having been out injured for a few months.
The next race for us was the mens race. There were 128 teams starting, although only 99 complete teams finished the race. Martin Gore and Paul Elliott led the Lasswade men off and ran well to hand over in 56th and 69th respectively. Niall Sheehan took over from Martin and produced the Lasswade performance of the day pulling back a massive 34 places to hand over in 22nd place. On the same leg Ross Finlayson took over from Paul Elliott and pulled back a couple of places to hand over to Kirk Smith in 67th. Paul Benham took over from Niall and despite suffering from cramp in his calf handed over in 24th place. On the final leg Ben Mitchell was the anchor man taking over from Paul and he ran a solid leg to finish in 28th place. Well done to everyone who took part.
For full results please click here
The first of this seasons East District Cross Country League races was held at Stirling University on 15/10/2011. There were 24 Lasswade athletes taking part in all age groups from Under 11 to Senior Men and Women. Unfortunately we had incomplete teams in some of the age groups which meant that we incurred penalty points.
Our Under 11 boys and girls fielded complete teams and there were fine performances with our highest placed runner in the boys race, Fraser Judge finishing 6th and our highest placed girl Natasha Selkirk finishing 5th with her sister Nicole close behind in 8th. The teams finished 7th and 6th respectively.
Our Under 13 boys also fielded a complete team and finished 12th team. In the girls race we were unable to field a complete team, however Rachel Hutchison had a strong individual run to finish 14th.
In the Under 15 boys race the team finished 6th with Jamie Cousin leading them home in 16th place. The Under 15 and Under 17 girls are incorporated in the same race, Amy Frankland showed her strength in finishing 6th overall with Amy Smith in 11th and Sophie Miller 31st. The team finished in 2nd position, our highest team placing of the day.
Ross Henderson the only Lasswade runner in the Under 17 boys race produced a fine performance to finish 12th.
Lorna Rice was also a lone performer in the women’s race finishing 78th.
The men’s race over three laps was a good race with a group of four runners, including our own Ross Matheson in the group and Barney Phillips also Lasswade just behind in 5th position. It was only on the final lap that gaps began to appear with Andrew Crichton breaking clear to win with Ross finishing 2nd and Barney pulling back one position to finish 4th. Paul Benham on the comeback trail was our next finisher followed by Ben Mitchell and then Paul Elliott. The men finished 11th team but clearly have the potential to finish much higher with a full team.
Overall the men are sitting 5th in the league and the women 8th. Well done to everyone!
For full results please click here.
For your diaries the next League Match is at Livingston on 20/11/2011.
