The NAPIER HARRIER CLUB inc.
Laurence Cup Road Races
Saturday August 19, 2000
Veteran Napier Harrier Alan Giles ran away with the Napier Harrier Club’s Laurence Cup on Saturday. Running from ‘Go’ Giles was never headed through out the 10km event along Napier’s Marine Parade. Eric Phimister came closest to catching Giles with an excellent run than gained him the senior ‘runner of the day’ award. The event is run on the ‘Open Handicap’ format whereby the slower runners have the advantage of starting first. Giles had a 17 minute head start over Phimister and it proved to be just enough as his lead was cut to just 24 seconds at the line. Mick Cull was third to finish another 18 seconds further back.
The race also doubled as the final race of the club’s Open Handicap Series, and Phimister’s excellent run was enough to see him win the Senior/Vets grade from Mark Speakman and Mark Todd, who were tied for second.
The women’s event, run over 5km, was taken out by Trish Cummins whose time of 23:34 saw her head home local running legend Marion Sherburn by a comfortable 38 seconds with Adele Marsh finishing strongly just 15 seconds behind. Cheryl Simpson’s 5th placing was enough for her to seal the win in the women’s open handicap series.
Andrew Prosser overcame a 1:35 deficit to take out the Under 14/16 boys 5km event from Hayden Schofer, but Schofer had secured enough points to gain him the series win, over Prosser with Stefan Smith finishing the series in third.
The junior girls saw another Heywood family double with Aleesha convincingly winning the under 12’s 2km race and big sister Shayna taking out the under 14/16 5km race. Both girls have also placed well in the series points with Aleesha tying with Brendan Speakman for first in the under 12’s and Shayna finishing runner up to Sonya Clark in the under 14/16 grade.
Fastest times were recorded by Mark Speakman (Senior/Vet Men) 34:20, Jo Cavanagh (Senior/Vet Women) 20:00, Josh Betty (Under 14/16 boys) 19:18, Annika Edmundson (Under 14/16 girls) 20:11, Hayley Sherbourne (Under 18 women) 21:16, and Hogan Green (under 12’s) 7:13.