It was another golden night for the Isle of Man athletics team last night, as Harriet Pryke produced another superb run in the final event of the night to win the gold medal in the women's 200 metres by a clear margin, in a new pb time of 24.76. This completes the 200m/400m double for her, and gave the Isle of Man a sixth athletics gold medal of the Games to date - that is more than in the last three Games put together! Harriet is in magnificent form this season, and although the 200 metres is her secondary event I fully expected her to win last night. She got an excellent start and was clearly ahead of most of the field in the first 50 metres, but entering the home straight she still had Aland's Hanna Wiss for company. Not for long though, as Harriet blasted down the home straight to leave the rest of the field trailing in her wake. She crossed the line, arm raised in triumph, nearly half a second clear of the Aland girl. Sarah Halligan was also in the race and as always gave it her all, but had to settle for an eighth place finish in a time of 26.36.
There were many near-misses last night with a host of fourth and fifth place finishes, including the women's discus event which opened the night's proceedings. Representing the Isle of Man were Louise Kneen in her tenth Games, and 16 year old Andrea de Bruin making her debut. It was an extremely close contest which followed a remarkably similar pattern to the men's javelin final the previous evening. Jersey's prodigiously talented young thrower Shadine Duquemin was way out in front, and the last placed competitor was some way adrift, but just 2.56 metres separated the other seven competitors! Louise has been restricted by a foot injury she picked up a few weeks ago and was unable to spin into her throws, but from a standing position she produced a really fine effort of 31.47 metres which gave her an excellent fourth place finish. Andrea was experiencing the Island Games atmosphere for the first time, and did very well to finish just behind Louise in fifth place with a best throw of 31.18 metres. She was a couple of metres short of her recently set pb, a repeat of which would have given her the silver medal, but she must have a great chance of medalling in future Games and should be applauded for her efforts last night.
The first track final of the night was the women's 400 metres hurdles, with Hannah Riley hoping to add another medal to the gold she took in the 100m hurdles earlier in the week. It didn't quite work out that way, but Hannah produced another superb performance to finish fourth. There may have been only five competitors in the final but it was a very high class race, and Hannah's time of 65.07 was the fastest she has run since Shetland 2005. Considering she has not really been training for this event and has not run faster than 68 in the past year, this was an amazing effort.
Hannah's brother Tom then went in the first semi-final of the men's 100 metres, and had no problems in qualifying for the final with a strong and controlled run to finish second in a time of 11.13.
Two young Games debutants then contested the women's long jump competition, which took place in front of a massive crowd in the stand and on the grass bank of the home straight. There really was a great atmosphere at the track last night. Bethan Pilley has had a long wait until the fifth day of competition to get into action, and made a highly impressive Games debut. The 16 year old jumped very consistently to progress to the second half of the competition in which she produced her best jump of 5.08 metres, just one centimetre short of her pb. This was good enough to give her a fifth place finish out of thirteen, which was a really great effort. Her final jump was bigger still, but unfortunately a marginal no jump. 15 year old Sinead Kaneen was the other Manx competitor, and she achieved a tenth place finish with a best jump of 4.61 metres. This is some way short of her pb and Sinead didn't make the cut for the final three jumps of the competition, but the experience of competing in two events at this level of competition will play a big part in her development as an athlete and she has done well this week.
The next event was the final of the women's 800 metres, with Rachael Franklin competing for the Isle of Man. The race was fast from the start, and Rachael was looking strong and controlled on the first lap. On lap two the pace at the front increased still further, with the two leaders stretching away from the field. Rachael was still in with a chance of the bronze medal in the home straight and finished strongly, but was unable to quite catch the athletes in front of her and came home sixth in 2.16.67. This is the fastest time ever run by a Manx athlete at the Island Games but that will be no consolation to Rachael who was desperate to win a medal at these Games. Shortly after the race she was promoted to fifth when the winner Eilidh Mackenzie of the Western Isles was disqualified for obstructing Shetland's Emma Leask in the home straight. I watched the incident back on my camcorder footage afterwards, and although you never want to see an athlete disqualified, the judges definitely made the correct decision.
The penultimate event was the men's 100 metres final, always a major highlight of any competition, and the Isle of Man's Tom Riley lined up hoping to add to his brilliant silver medal in the hurdles event. Tom ran really well and could have done no more, but had to settle for a fourth place finish this time, just 0.08 of a second behind the bronze medallist. He has the relays to look forward to today in which we should do well. The final event was the golden women's 200 metres final which has already been fully covered.
Today is the final day of competition, and should bring great excitement. We have Daniel Stewart-Clague in the triple jump final, followed by Gemma Astin in the women's 5000 metres final (her sister Sarah has had to withdraw due to injury). Then comes the men's 1500 metres final with Keith Gerrard and Andy Barron, and this should be a fantastic race between Keith and the Isle of Wight's Joseph Wade whose 1500m pb is slightly faster than Keith's. The two 4x100 metres relays follow in which we have real medal potential, and then Kevin Loundes and Martin Malone contest the men's 10,000 metres final - Kev will be optimistic of adding another medal to his Half Marathon silver. The action is then completed by the two 4x400 metres relays, in which we are strong in both.
The athletics team have won six golds and three silvers so far (no bronzes) and will hopefully add to that collection significantly today. Go Manxies!!
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