Oxford Seniors squeezed out in tight finish
Published: 15 April 2017
Oxford kicked off their Southern Athletics League season with a home match against Brighton & Hove, Reading and Newbury. The match was close fought throughout, with the lead changing regularly between last season’s newly promoted Reading, old rivals Newbury, and a tenacious Oxford team. Oxford enjoyed lots of success, and were in the end only denied victory by a handful of points. Reading finished on 204, Newbury earned 191.5 points, while Oxford had to settle for 190 points. For Oxford the stars were mostly in the women’s team, with wins for Becky Hussey in the A string 100m (12.4s), Ella Turner in the A string 400m (57.2s), Alice Byles in the A string 400mH (63.4s), Amberley Vircavs in the A string long jump (4.84m), Anna Niedbala in the A string discus (42.26m), A string hammer (42.33m), and A string shot (11.70m), Amy Walter in the B string hammer (27.57m) and Danielle Anderson in the A string javelin (35.40m). The men struggled for wins, but Will Gardner ran intelligently for his B string 1500m victory in 4:23.7s, while Tim Stephens and Aidan Whiting bagged a very good pair of wins in the A and B string long jump – 6.41m and 6.10m respectively. Aidan also won the B string 110mH, with a time of 16.3s, and contributed a storming 2nd leg in the 4 x 400m relay, which Oxford won�in a time of 3:51.6s, Tim Stephens, Will Gardner and Nigel Whiting making up the winning quartet. There were great performances from regulars Mark Warland, Gary Walter,�Nigel Whiting,�Les Newell,��John Atyeo, and newcomer Daniel Beard, while youngsters Pat Wilson, Matt Hamp and Jayden Guiste all showed up well in the sprints. Les Newell stepped in at the last minute to run the 1500m and 2k steeplechase back-to-back, while�Dan Garden, Amberley Vircavs, Ruby Parker,�Jade Walker,�Jess Walter,�Kathryn Munday,�Jess�Duckett, Elisa Robins, Ciara Huxley,�Isabell Hess-Peterson,�Kevin Dykes, Phil Huxley�and evergreen Sarah Davies all contributed massive points. Oxford march on to the second round with a match against North Devon in Braunton on May 21st.
