Welsh Road Relays

Newport Harriers Welsh Road Relay Championships

Welsh Road Relay Championships

Swansea Waterfront Saturday 22nd March 2008

This season’s championships took place in gale force conditions on a flat course that took in the picturesque docks waterfront and Norwegian Church together with the Port of Swansea industrial roads and recycling rubbish tips. This year Newport Harriers were unable to field a senior men’s or senior women’s team, though our two teams that did compete were amongst the medals.

Championship success for Under-15 Boys

This race consisted of 3 x 3km legs and was run concurrently with Under-17 Boys and corresponding races for women, making eight teams in total. Newport won the U15 Boys race, 3 minutes 45 seconds ahead of second placed Swansea. 1st leg runner Daniel Chesworth put Newport in the overall lead ahead of the Under-17 teams. Chris Carpanini maintained this lead on leg 2. Elliott Hardee provided the fastest leg in the U15 race to anchor Newport to victory. Such was the quality of their performance that they beat all the other U17 teams apart from Carmarthen.

Silver medals for Masters 35+ team

The Senior and Masters race combined nine Senior teams and 13 Masters teams. Seniors ran 4 legs and Masters ran 3 legs over the 5km course. Lead-off man Neil Hardee produced another big run to place Newport 3rd overall with what proved to be the fastest Masters run of the day. Full-time footballer Mark Carpanini only runs in his spare time but produced a quality run on leg 2 to provide anchor-man Darryn McAtee with a cushion over 3rd placed Chepstow that he comfortably maintained to the finish.