Downs League, Epsom Downs 8th November 2009

Croydon Harriers enjoy Downs League wins

By Mike Fleet »

Croydon Harriers youngsters enjoyed a fine start in the Downs Cross Country league at Epsom on Sunday.

They registered two individual wins and a team victory to set up the series well.

Their U13 squad, led home in the best possible way by the tigerish first placer Harvey Stainthorpe, took the keenly contested team win.

Trinity boy Stainthorpe struck decisively for the finish with about 50m remaining.

Next home was the fast improving Kartik Iyer in eighth and the clubs A scoring quartet was completed by Stirling Gibbons in tenth and Andrew Statter in eleventh.

Stevie Lawrence in fifteenth was the third girl finisher in the field of 38.

In form U15 Patrick Lucas ran clear in his category to win by nearly a minute, a performance all the more creditable for he had won a tough Surrey Schools League race at Oxted the previous day, when running for John Fisher School.

News Story October 09

Croydon triple jumper Trevor Okoroafor is targeting success at London 2012 after being rescued from a two-year injury nightmare by a new sponsor.

The 19-year-old, once ranked third in the world for his age group, has barely jumped in the last two years because of a stress fracture to his back and then a tear in his right knee.

With money running low, the Croydon Harrier considered giving up the sport altogether during his lay-off before the Global Sponsorship Group picked him as one of six athletes it would sponsor and provide full management for in the lead up to 2012.

"They have rescued me from the scrapheap," said the former Archbishop Lanfranc pupil currently studying Sports Science at Middlesex University.

"When I was offered it I was down to the bare bones, I had practically nothing.

"But they have given me the platform now to be the best I can be."

Okoroafor took up triple jumping when he was 15 on the advice of friends and looked set for big things.

In his first full year of competition he won the English Schools U17 Championships and the AAA U17 Championships, rising to third in the world with a jump of 15.37m in 2007 before his injury hell began.

"I got a stress fracture in my back and missed a whole year and a half before tearing my lateral meniscus in my knee, which saw me miss the whole of the juniors.

"It was really frustrating and I even contemplated my future in the sport.

"But now GSG has come along and given me a lifeline.

"I am in the final stages of my rehabilitation project at the moment and things are going to be better.

"I would definitely like to come out in 2010 and jump but I am not going to say exactly what I want to do because I did that last year then got injured again.

"The long term aim though is the Olympics.

"I know if I am fit and everything is going properly I can make the Great Britain team."

Croydon 10K Sunday 18^th October

http://www.croydon10k.com

Surrey XC League Div 4, match 1 @ Cranford Park 9^th October 2009.

Croydon Harriers’ cross-country team got their Surrey league campaign off to a promising start on Saturday, with a third place finish at Cranford Park writes Matthew Kiernan.

Chasing promotion after being disappointingly relegated to the league’s fourth tier last season, Croydon needed a strong start and got one thanks to prodigious talent James Buchanan.

The 26 year-old led the 13-strong team home in a time of 26.53 over the five-mile course, to finish third.

The Harriers proceeded to pack the latter half of the top 20, with Ian Wright (11^th, 30:09), David Brown (16^th, 30.33), Colin Oxlade (18^th, 30.41) and Julian Dillow (19^th, 30.42) all in close contention.

The scoring team of ten was completed by Adam Schooz (25^th, 31:55), Andy Del Nevo (29^th, 32.28), Ali Kaplankiran (40^th, 33:39), Aaron Noyce (48^th, 34:31) and Keith Brown (64^th, 37:13).

Meanwhile, Mark Plackett was narrowly beaten in the 2.5mile U17 race, having to settle for second in a time of 15.31.

The U13 team also enjoyed a podium finish, with Andrew Statter, Ben Gales and Tim McGrath ensuring third place out of the nine competing teams.

English Schools Championship multi-eventer 19th-20th September 2009

CROYDON Harrier Kariym Irving gave further indication of his potential as a multi-eventer last weekend, when he finished eighth of 38 in the decathlon in the English Schools Championship at Bedford.

The first year Under 20 produced a score of 6,018 points, which constituted a new club record. His achievement is the more exciting since he is in his first months of pole vaulting, and needs to work on his 400m and 1,500m runs.

The John Fisher student top scored in his favourite discus, earning 772 points with a throw of 45.23m. His crisp 100m hurdles run in 16.6sec also topped the 700-point mark. Irving's other performances were: 100m 11.81sec, long jump 6.34m, shot 11.98m, high jump 1.84m, 400m 57.7sec and 1,500m 5:14.

Faraz Rafi (U15) scored 2,193 points in the pentathlon to place 28th

Surrey Road Relays @ Wimbledon 12^th September 2009

Croydon Harrier’s road runners enjoyed their most successful outing in three years at the Surrey relay championships on Saturday writes Matthew Kiernan.

The Harriers finished 14^th in the six stage relay at Wimbledon and showed encouraging signs ahead of the upcoming cross country season.

Andrew Del Nevo (18:34, 18^th) got Croydon off to a solid start, while George Thatcher starred on 2^nd leg, moving up three places with the club’s fastest time of the day of 16:13.

David Brown (17:27), Julian Dillow (18:13) and Keith Brown (18:35) maintained Croydon in 15^th, before Colin Oxlade (17:50) anchored the team home to pip Striders of Croydon by just three seconds to place 14^th out of the 21 teams who finished.

14^th	1:46:32
Andy Del Nevo	18:14
George Thatcher	16:13
David Brown	17:27
Julian Dillow	18:13
Keith Brown	18:35
Colin Oxlade	17:50

http://www.belgraveharriers.com/results/Surrey_RR_2009/SM.pdf – full results