Category Archives: Club Athletics

The Hampshire league may be a bit misnamed, it is organised by Hampshire Athletics Association, but athletes from Surrey, Berkshire, Dorset, IOW and the Channel Islands compete alongside their Hampshire counter parts.

This leads to a very competitive and very tough competition. The Hampshire Athletes and their performances are monitored by HAA during the season, and their performances are utilised to pick the Hampshire County Representative team.

This will be a tough League for Robbie, not only is it very competitive but he will be running in the bottom age group, competing in the U13’s at 11 years old.

The Hampshire League comprises of 5 individual races, the results of which are fed in to an overall individual results table and an overall team results table.

• Race 1 – Farley Mount – 7th
  • 08/10/2011

This first Hampshire League race introduces some names that become very familiar over the next few years. Daniel Cooke, now running for Camberley, Piers Copeland running for Wimborne and Matt Rawlings running for Reading are just a few.

With James Fleming in 4th, a great first race at u13’s for him, Daniel Cooke in 6th, Harry Grace (AFD) in 7th. Robbie finishing in 9th, 3 seconds in front of 10th place Matt Rawlings.

• Race 2 – Goodwood – 12th
  • 12/11/2011

Sean Pocknee finished for AFD in 5th place, Robbie finished in 12th and Harry Grace finished for AFD in 13th. Just a few of the AFD athletes in attendance.

• Race 3 – Popham Airfield, Basingstoke – 16th
  • 03/12/2011

Hampshire League 2011/12 Race 3

The third race in the series saw a new face for AFD, one that will become very familiar and will frequently be associated with winning.

Sean Pocknee was 2nd in for AFD in 4th place and Robbie was 3rd right down in 16th. Beat on the day by a number of familiar names.

• Alex Rowe (Guernsey) – 6th
• Daniel Cooke (Camberley) – 9th
• Matt Rawlings (Reading) – 11th
• James Fleming (Camberley) – 13th
• Archie Ives (Winchester) – 15th

• Race 4 – King’s park, Bournemouth – 4th
  • 14/01/2012

Well 2011 didn’t give much to Robbie’s results or performances. The league was always expected to be hard, but many of Robbie’s contemporaries stepped up to the task with greater success than he did himself, this is the first event of 2012, let’s hope we can start to see an improvement.

Robbie completed the race as the second AFD runner and with his best performance to date in the Hampshire League, finishing 4th in 8’32”, 1 second ahead of Matt Rawlings. Familiar rivals James Fleming and Daniel Cooke of Camberley finished 10th and 12 respectively and future Hampshire team mate Archie Ives  finished in 15th place.

• Race 5 – Hudson’s Field, Salisbury – 9th
  • 11/02/2012

The final race of the series, with AFD getting some exceptional results in other age groups the team events are looking good across the board.

3rd in for AFD finishing in 9th place with a time of 11’24”, with Luke Powell beating him by 1 second in a tight finish that saw only 5 seconds between Robbie and 4th place.

Some names and positions to mention.

• James Fleming (Camberley) – 10th
• Matt Rawlings (Reading) – 11th
• Harry Grace (AFD) 12th
• Archie Ives (Winchester) 14th
• Lawrence Gilfrin (AFD) 16th

Overall Standings.

Individual

The overall individual standings are calculated by taking each runners best 4 results and adding them together, the lowest score wins.

On the medal front, 1 gold medal is issued, 1 silver medal is issued and 4 bronze medals are issued. So joining Tom Verney for Bronze medals were James Fleming, Matt Rawlings and Tom Bourne. Robbie missed out on an Individual medal placing 6th overall.

Team The Team event is based on the Team position for each race, added together to create a score. There are no dropped results in the team section, so all team positions for all races count. The lowest score wins.

The Hampshire League Winning Team.

The athletes that represented AFD throughout the League in the U13’s were; Billy Smith, Chris Snook, Harry Grace, Zac Ayers, Jack Boswell, James Hier, James Pocknee, Lawrence Gilfrin, Robbie Coupland, Reece Webber, Sam McCready, Sean Pocknee, Tom Galloway, Tom Potter and Will Passmore. All of whom helped to contribute to the overall success of the club in this event. A total of 129 different athletes competed in the U13 boys section.

Quite astounding to see AFD not only winning the U13 Boys overall event, but in fact winning the team event in every single race.

AND FINALLY !!!

Robbie’s position of 9th, was sufficient to get him selected for the Hampshire County Cross Country Team. Awesome job.

The Hampshire Championships are always a hard fought battle, 2012 shows a large U13 AFD boys team. So we’d hope to see an excellent team performance, much like the 2012 Hampshire League.

Distance 2700m

Individual Results

Alex Rowe from Guernsey finished in 4th and Robbie finished in 5th with a time of 9’28”.

Team Results

Robbie only competed in two seasons of the Border League, moving his racing emphasis to the Hampshire League events, which feeds the Hampshire County selection process, and keeping some Sunday’s free for Football.

Robbie setting the pace in the 4th Border League race.

The Border League comprises of 4 individual races, the results of which are fed in to an overall individual results table and an overall team results table. It is organised and run every year by Camberley Athletic Club.

• Race 1 – Lord Wandsworth College – 2nd
  • 07/11/2010

Robbie’s first meeting with Sean Pocknee, a talented new addition to AFD’s line up.

Sean Pocknee finished in 4th Place.

• Race 2 – Farnham Park – 1st
  • 12/12/2010

Location and event organisation for the Farnham Park race was by AFD, the steep upward sloping start seem to suit the boys really well, all those Thursday night hill training sessions coming in to practice. This is the first time we can remember seeing Daniel Cooke, another one of Robbie’s long term running opponents. In this race he was running for Bracknell, but he later moved to Camberley.

Daniel Cooke finishes in 4th place. Robbie’s Fleet Spurs team mate Matt Farmiloe finishes in 12’15” placing him 33rd in  a very competitive race.

• Race 3 – Guildford – 1st
  • 06/02/2011

• Race 4 – Lightwater – 2nd
  • 27/02/2011

After leading the race comfortably for a long time, Robbie relaxed out in the front, leading the pack by almost 400m at one point. His relaxation ultimately his undoing as Sean sprinted past him, quite literally grabbing the lead as they crossed the line.

Overall Standings.

Individual

The overall individual standings are calculated by taking each runners best 3 results and adding them together, the lowest score wins.

Team The Team event is based on the Team position for each race, added together to create a score. There are no dropped results in the team section, so all team positions for all races count. The lowest score wins.

As you can see the team performance improved over the duration of the League, the team placing per race is based on the finishing positions of the first 4 finishing athletes for that team, so in the final race AFD won with 1,2,8 (Chris Snook),13 (Jacob Ayers) giving a score of 24 points, Bracknell came second with 32 points. Over the event AFD contributions at U11 also came from Zac Ayers and Lawrence Gilfrin.

Robbie’s first season of competition for AFD see’s him taking part in the Border League cross country championships in the U11 age group.

The Border League comprises of 4 individual races, the results of which are fed in to an overall individual results table and an overall team results table. It is organised and run every year by Camberley Athletic Club.

• Race 1 – Lightwater – 2nd

Robbie’s first meeting with James Fleming (Camberley) sees James take first place, but what an excellent first race. James and Robbie have a friendly rivalry that is still going strong in 2013.

• Race 2 – Guildford

This was the first time Robbie came up against team mate Harry Grace, still running together at AFD in 2013 Harry and Robbie are good friends, but this was a very closely fought race. Robbie put everything in to the finish, with Harry nearly taking him in the last 100 meters. So much effort went in to that 100 meters that Robbie had to be carried away from the finish line by his Grandad.

James Fleming finds himself pushed in to 4th place.

• Race 3 – Basingstoke

Robbie finished in 5th place with a time of 10.40.

• Race 4 – Lightwater

The final race of the season saw Harry Grace (AFD) pushed in to 4th place, and James Fleming (Camberley) pushed in to 7th.

Overall Standings.

Individual

The overall individual standings are calculated by taking each runners best 3 results and adding them together, the lowest score wins.

Team
The Team event is based on the Team position for each race, added together to create a score. There are no dropped results in the team section, so all team positions for all races count. The lowest score wins.

Still seems odd to me that as a team AFD could win 3 out of 4 races and still not win the team event, but hey, who am I? 🙂

Robbie Collecting his Individual Winners Medal for Border League 2009/10