Weekly Roundup
Alan O’Shea, James Mason and Abdi Madar led the Herne Hill Harriers’ charge at the Virgin London Marathon, with the three athletes finishing inside the top-60 positions.
Irishman O’Shea clocked two hours, 32 minutes, two seconds, in finishing 51st, while Mason was 56th in 2.32.29, one place and one second ahead of Madar. Ruth Chalmers was the first Herne Hill woman to finish, completing the 26.2-mile route in 3.09.45, placing 161st in the women’s field.
Harriers were celebrating before the main race had even begun, as Turkay Korkmaz won the U13B race in the series of London Mini Marathon events run over the final miles of the marathon course. Korkmaz clocked an impressive 15.56 to win the three-mile race by two seconds. In other races, Eloise O’Shaughnessy (U13G) was eighth and first London athlete, Ed Olsen (U17B) was 24th and Mohammed Ali (U13B) was 48th.
The main race featured more than a dozen Harriers athletes, with Francis Marsh winning the battle for third clubman as he finished 244th in 2.41.56. Marsh, 14th overall in the V45 age group, was closely pursued by serial marathoner Jonathan Ratcliffe (318th and 27th V45) in 2.43.53. Luxembourg-based Jeff Cunningham also broke the 2.50 barrier, finishing in 2.48.48 in 511th. Robert Edwards (665th) clocked a six-minute personal best, posting a time of 2.51.46.
Read on in The Common Runner