The British Masters Combined Events Championships were held in Liverpool this year and Eastbourne Rovers Athletic Club certainly took the South Coast up north. After recent great weather the conditions prediction were not looking great in the lead up to the major event. Brian Slaughter and Grant Stirling were certainly up for the challenge to make their mark. Grant having this year won a European Indoor Bronze and a World Outdoor 6th place for Triple Jump and Brian Slaughter the multiple combined event winner and record holder were ready for action. The rain held off, but strong gales put paid to recording fast track times on day one. The traditional opener event of 100m was faced with the against and across wind reducing times and in turn those all-important points on the board. So, times were solid rather than record breaking. Next up a strong event for Grant was long jump and again they recorded strong performances. Next up a strong one for Brian the shot putt as he was chasing his recently moved into new age group and British record attempt for the decathlon having already being the holder of these records in the lower age groups. He had to wait until his last throw to record a 10.69m distance. The wind was again not ideal for the fourth event of the day of the high jump as officials had to hold the bar in place until the last minute before people jumped. Brian was happy with his 1.38 but Grant not so with his. We are now down to the fifth and final event of day one as deciding how to run the 400m in the conditions presented. On reflection despite Brian’s experience, he got it wrong in going out to hard and therefore paying the price by scoring 200 points less than he should. Grant was happier in the circumstances to record one of the fastest times of the day.
Day two started with better conditions for the sprint hurdles as Grant recorded 17.08 to Brian’s 18.41 despite their age group differences and therefore different championship. Grant being just edged out by two hundreds by his nearest rival. Brian led the field in the discus with 35.84 and then was second across all age groups in the pole vault with 2.70 1st time clearance. They were now down to the penultimate Javelin throw before the famous 1500m to finish. Just before the 1500m started Grant was now ahead in the silver medal for his M45 age group and Brian was clear in the lead for the M65 and the overall handicap for most points scored. The two of them ran solid races to conclude with these medals. Brian’s 6947 points was just 200 points short of the British Record. Afterwards he said “it’s been a great weekend of competition, catching up with rivals but just falling short of the British Record was hard but the conditions put paid to that. We now need to decide which competition next”
Brian and Grant are shown holding up their hard-fought medals.
