BMAF 5k Championships – Battersea Park – Sunday 01stDecember 2024
Words: Mark Tennyson, Photos: Helen Holcroft
For the third successive year, the British Masters 5k road championships took place in Battersea Park. Veterans Athletic Club were the hosts and their fast course attracted a very high quality field. Eleven ‘Masters’ athletes from Guildford & Godalming assembled to take part in one of the two wavestarts. Wave one was for all men aged under sixty-five and two minutes later wave two all women and men over sixty-five.
The M55 team comprising Terry Booth (M55-2), Mark Tennyson (17:45) and Guy Holcroft (18:01) picked up silver medals. Terry’s excellent time of 16:35 was rewarded with an individual M55 silver medal. Terry was only ten seconds off the gold in his category, which went to Aldershot’s Mark Symes.
The M35’s, who were silver medallists at this event last year,had to settle for bronze this time around. The scoring three of Luke Bishop (17:55), Phil Purves (17:57) and Mike Garnett (18:13) completed the course within less than twenty seconds of one another. Also, James Adams was not too far behind, recording a decent time of 18:29. Gold will be the target for this group next time to complete the set.
Our M45 team of Nick Tearle (17:11), Ben Gilmore (18:49) and Ian Durrant (18:52) finished just outside of the medals in fourth place.
The G’s only representative in wave two, Susanna Harrison (20:59), picked up the W60 bronze medal in a very strong category. In a tight finish, Susanna was only a few seconds away from the silver medal taken by Cambridge Harriers Rose Baker, but equally was just ahead of the fourth place finisher Veteran AC’s Lucy Woolhouse.
On the world stage ‘Masters’ athletics is growing rapidly, notably in the older age categories. Veterans AC’s Joe Aspinall (W85) was the oldest finisher in the men’s event recording a time of 39:51. Waverley’s Penny Elliott (W80) stopped the clock on 31:43 in the women’s event.
