On the final UK Women’s Premier League match of the season Edinburgh’s senior ladies travelled to Lee Valley, London in their quest to secure top flight competition for next year.  Edinburgh entered this match in 4^th place, having recorded two 5^th place finishes in the previous two matches.  The girls put in some excellent performances and on the day managed to finish 4^th overall resulting in them finishing 5^th in the league for 2011.  On the day the match was won by Birchfield on 200 points with City of Manchester and Woodford Green with Essex Ladies joint 2^nd with 180 points and Edinburgh on 177 points.  This meant that Birchfield won the league with 22 league points from City of Manchester in 2^nd on 20.5 points, Windsor, Slough, Eton and Hounslow in 3^rd on 16 points, Woodford Green with Essex Ladies in 4^th on 14.5 points, Edinburgh 5^th with 13 points and Enfield and Haringey in 6^th on 10 points.  Trafford and Cardiff will be relegated having finished 7^th and 8^th.

The track got underway with Avril Jackson in the 400m hurdles placing 6^th A with 64.30.  Catriona Pennet, our 100m hurdles specialist, stepped up to finish 5^th in the B 400m hurdles with a seasons best of 65.22.  Catriona also competed in the 100m hurdles finishing 3^rd A in 14.53 (-0.8).  Emma Lowry placed 6^th in the B 100m hurdles race with 16.26 (-1.2).

In the sprints, Beth Finlayson finished 4^th in the A 100m in a new personal best of 12.31 (-0.3) (previous best 12.33).  The 17 year old also ran well in the B 200m finishing 2^nd just outside her best with 24.77(-0.6).  Carly Sharp placed 5^th in the B 100m with 12.62(-0.3) and Stacey Downie placed 6^th in the 200m A race with 24.90 (-0.6).  We had two 5^th place finishes in the 400m with Stacey running 55.80 in the A race and Mhari MacDonald running 58.34 in the B race.

The middle distance team undoubtedly held the team together gaining valuable points, personal bests and seasons bests.  In the 800m, Kathryn Evans ran a seasons best of 2.09.01 to finish 3^rd in the A race.  Eighteen year old Emily Dudgeon ran a superb race where she was rewarded with a new personal best of 2.09.09 for 1^st in the B race.  This is the first time Emily has run under 2.10.00 and evidently this places her 9^th in the UK U20 rankings.  Emily is in consistent form this year and I am sure that she can lower this time even further.  There were fine performances in the 1500m where Sarah Hood, UK Senior bronze medallist, claimed 1^st in the A race in a time of 4.30.33 and Laura Dunn ran 4.51.81 for 2^nd in the B race.  Laura also gained more valuable points when she contested the 3000m finishing 1^st B in 10.09.60.  In the A race, Emily Stewart placed 2^nd in 9.32.13, a time just outside her best.  However, it was in the 2000m steeple chase where Emily produced an excellent display of running.  In her first ever steeple chase and with no barrier practice Emily ran 6.52.82 (non scoring) which catapulted her to 4^th in the UK Senior Rankings.  With some practice and another winter I am sure that we will see big improvements here.  In the match event, Lauren Stoddart finished a fine 2^nd with 7.21.99 narrowly outside her best of 7.21.88.

Over in the field, there was a clean sweep in the high jump where in form Jayne Nisbet jumped 1.80m and newly crowned UK Senior bronze medallist Emma Nuttall jumped 1.70m.  Sarah Warnock and Lisa Ferguson took care of the horizontal jumps.  Sarah jumped 5.78m (-1.9) to win the B long jump where Lisa jumped 5.88m (-1.6) to finish 4^th A.  In the triple jump Sarah finished 7^th A with 10.78m (0.6) and Lisa finished 5^th B with 10.07m (1.9).  As like the previous two matches, we had no representation in the pole vault.

The throwing events got underway with the hammer where Susan McKelvie finished 2^nd A with another consistent throw of 62.02m and Hannah Evenden finished 2^nd B with 51.54m.  As usual Hannah had a busy day placing 4^th A in the Discus with 42.83m and 5^th A in the shot putt with 12.82m.  Julie Wyatt placed 4^th B in the discus with 37.26m and Emma Lowry, in her second event of the day, finished 6^th B in the shot putt with 10.66m.  With no javelin throwers available for this match Susan and Emma stepped in both placing 8^th with 23.57m and 14.73m respectively.

At the close of the match both relay teams ran their second quickest times of the season.  The 4x100m team (Sarah Warnock, Beth Finlayson, Carly Sharp, Stacey Downie) finished 5^th with a time of 47.49.  Having competed in the 800m at Crystal Palace the night before, running 2.02.73 for 10^th, the 4x400m team were happy to welcome in Lynsey Sharp.  The team of (Mhari MacDonald, Emily Dudgeon, Kathryn Evans, Lynsey Sharp) finished 3^rd with 3.45.9.

Overall, there has been a great team spirit this year and we have set a good grounding which I am sure we will improve on next year.

All the athletes would like to thank our leader Anne Scott who has worked extremely hard this season.  Of course, she has been helped along the way with her partners in crime Moira Maguire and John Scott.

We would also like to thank our dedicated officials: Elsie Morris, Helena Black, Jean Robertson, Johnnie Robertson, Moira Nisbet, Brian Nisbet, Lynne Jackson and Alistair Aitchison for supporting the team and doing an efficient job at all matches.

Good luck to all the girls for the rest of the 2011 season.

Susan McKelvie (Captain)