See GALAS page for further Biathlon competitions.
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The World Biathle Championships took place on Sunday, 30th September at Larvotto Beach in Monaco. 12 athletes from the Dorset Pentathlete club squad qualified to represent Great Britain following their performances at the British Biathle held during the beginning of August. The Dorset Pentathletes Club is made of up athletes from Poole Swimming Club, Tornadoes South Dorset Swimming Club, West Dorset Warriors Swimming Club and Weymouth Swimming Club. Three Poole Swimming club members Melissa Courtney (Youth C Girls – U15 British Champion), Grace Howie & Kathleen Rafferty (Youth D Girls – U13) all qualified to represent Great Britain.
Melissa was the only athlete from Dorset Pentathlete team to win a Gold medal and become World Champion in the Youth C Girls event. She had tough opposition from South Africa athletes who finished 2nd 3rd, & 4th the race consisted of 500m run/100m swim/500m run, in the first run Melissa was also brought down by one of the South Africans on a sharp bend just before the sea swim, but pulled herself up, and managed to pull away in the sea, with a good transition she gave herself a good lead to finish first 10 seconds ahead to win in 5mins 08, next British girl home was Joanne Puckett (Tornadoes) 6th place in 5mins 38. There were 33 athletes competing in her race from among the following countries GB, South Africa, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Egypt, Spain, Austria to name a few.
Grace Howie finished 6th in 4mins 41 in her debut at the World Championships and Kathleen Rafferty 12th in 4mins 59 she will be in the same age group again next year (Youth D Girls – their race consisted of 500m run/50m swim/500m run). British competitor Ellie Walton won gold in this age group with a winning time of 4mins 26.
In total Great Britain won 9 gold medals full results can be seen on the MPAGB webpage.
Melissa & Grace also won a medal for the World Series competition after both winning their races at Weymouth earlier in the summer, Melissa won Silver and Grace won bronze which were presented at the closing ceremony on Sunday evening at the Stars ‘n Bars restaurant at Monaco harbour.
National Biathle Championships 2007
Melissa Courtney was the only local athletic to win Gold at Salford Quays, Manchester at the British Biathle Championships and is heading to represent Great Britain in Monaco this September for the World Championships with 12 other Dorset Pentathletes Club members.
21 Local athletes took part in this year’s National Biathle Championships held at Salford Quays Manchester. The event consisted of a run/swim/run competition with distances comprising of 500m, to 1500m run 50m, to 200m swim followed by the same distance run again, the distances done varied with each age group. The Dorset Pentahletes club which is the combination of athletes from Tornadoes of South Dorset SC (TSDSC), West Dorset Warriors SC (WDWSC), Poole SC (PSC) & Weymouth SC (WSC) had 21 athletes taking parting the event. The event was also a selection event for the World Championships in Monaco on the 30 September with the top 6 in each age group being selected for Great Britain.
In the girls 12 & under Grace Howie (PSC) was our first medal winner of the day taking silver in 5m also in the age group Kathleen Rafferty (PSC) was 4th, both have qualified for the GB team.
The next races to go where the girls and boys 14 & under who run 500m, swim 100m, and run 500m. Once again the local athletes showed every one a clean set of heels, with Melissa Courtney (PSC) winning gold in the girls race in 5m 24 followed by Joanna Puckett (TSDSC) in second and both girls being selected for the GB team and as in all their races earlier this year taking first and second. In the boys race Bradley Gale (PAC) was 7th which puts him as 1st reserve and Oscar Tweed (WDWSC) was 9th (3rd reserve) for the team; Alex Sampson from Poole finished in 11th place in his first Biathle National competition.
The last race of the day where there was local interest was the boys and girls 16 & under who had to run 1000m swim 200m and run 1000m. In the girls race Claire Rafferty (PSC) was 9th in 12min 58sec and is 3rd reserve for the GB team. The strongest field of the day was the boys race it was very close after the first run with 8 athletes hitting the water together but Tom Crew (TSDSC) pulled away in the swim with the front group and had to work hard to finish 5th in 10min 06sec and was selected for the GB team, Charles Spencer (PSC) who competed in his first Biathle competition and bottom age group was 13th, Niall Laming (TSDSC) 15th and Tom Cain (TSDSC) 17th.
The team had 2 National Champions, 2 Silver, and 1 bronze medallist, with 12 athletes being selected to represent Great Britain at the World Championships.
Team coach Michael Flaherty said this is an excellent achievement for the athletes from Dorset with 12 biathletes being selected for the British team and having 4 reserves, for the World Championships in Monaco on 30 September. Last year we had 9 athletes in the team this year we have bettered that by 3 which is the most athletes from Dorset to be selected for the Biathle World Championships. Training for the Biathle will take place at Weymouth beach throughout the summer, for more details contact Mick Flaherty at flah64@supanet.com The team are also looking for any potential sponsors, so if you are interested in sponsoring a up and coming and successful team the please contact me at the above e-mail.
National Biathlon Championships Norwich
Melissa Courtney wins National Biathlon Championship for Youth C Girls (U15) at Norwich on Sunday, 20 May 2007. Melissa achieved the best run time with a personal best for her of 2.55 for 1000m after winning the running event. This win is a double for Melissa after winning the Schools National Biathlon earlier this year in March for Year 9 Girls. Melissa was competing for the newly formed Dorset MPA Team which consists of Poole Swimming Club, West Dorset Swimming Club, South Dorset Tornadoes and other athletes from other local clubs. Melissa’s team also won and members included Joanne Puckett of Tornadoes and Shelby Haysom of Poole SC.
Poole Swimming Club members Grace Howie and Phoebe Notley were competing in Youth D Girls with Francesca Taylor of West Dorset and they won their team event and Grace was 5th overall and Phoebe 6th overall.
Charles Spencer (Poole Swimming Club) was in a team with Tom Crew and Niall Laming (Tornadoes) they finished 2nd in the team event for Youth B Boys.
Sam Adams (Bournemouth Dolphins) was 2nd overall in Youth C Boys and his team of Brett Bassett (Kelly College) and Oscar Tweed (West Dorset) also finished in team 2nd place.
All the Poole Swimming Club members including Sam Adams are also members of Poole Athletic Club.
Results Dorset Biathlon Sunday 28th January 2007
click
here for the results