The silver medal winning 4x100m relay team in Shetland in 2005 of Hollie Bass, Hannah Riley, Harriet Pryke and Sarah Dowling (photo Gail Griffiths).
Harriet Pryke blasts off in her 400m heat in Rhodes in 2007 (photo Ian Astin).
Hollie Bass gazes lovingly at her High Jump bronze medal in Shetland in 2005 – or was she sending a text? (photo Gail Griffiths).
Total commitment from Sarah Dowling in the 400m Final in Rhodes in 2007 (photo Ian Astin).
The final 3 athletes to be featured in the pre-event build-up are the most experienced Island Games competitors in the women’s team. They will be competing in their 3rd, 4th and 5th Island Games respectively, and between them they already have a total of 11 medals – 3 individual ones and 8 in relay events.
Many of the team have improved greatly over the past year or so, but few more so than 19 year old sprinter Harriet Pryke. She has always been a very natural athlete and she achieved great success as a youngster, being selected for the Commonwealth Youth Games in Australia in 2004 when she was only 14. She made her Island Games debut in Shetland the following year, when she was the youngest member of the team. She did really well to get into the finals of both the 100m and 200m, finishing 8th and 6th respectively. She was part of the silver medal winning 4x100m relay team, and was denied a bronze medal in the 4x400m relay when the team was disqualified.
The Rhodes Games in 2007 were a little disappointing for Harriet in the individual events, as she was eliminated in the heats of the 200m and 400m, the latter event being fairly new to her at that stage. The real drama came in the 4x100m Relay Final when Harriet, running the anchor leg, was obstructed by Guernsey’s 3rd leg runner who collapsed in a heap in front of her after handing over to her teammate. Thankfully Harriet’s great agility and lightning reflexes enabled her to hurdle the human obstacle in her path, but she had lost a lot of ground. Undeterred, she recovered her bearings to produce a storming run that hauled the team back into the bronze medal position – a great performance.
After 2 or 3 difficult years when she didn’t really build on her early great promise for a number of reasons, Harriet’s athletics career has been transformed since she started at London’s Brunel University last year. A combination of University life, a top coach, high quality training partners and a lot of very hard work have done wonders, and Harriet has rapidly developed into a really outstanding senior athlete. Her improvement this year in the 400m, now her specialist event, has been quite incredible. Last weekend she won the silver medal in the Northern U20 Championships in a time of 56.92 – at the start of 2009 her pb was 60.2! She is presently ranked in the top 20 in the UK in the Under 20 age group.
Harriet is entered in the 200m, 400m and both relays in Aland, and has a really great chance of success in them all. I ventured the opinion in a recent entry on the blog that Julie Harrison’s Island Games 400m record of 55.1, set in 1995, should be safe for another 2 years. I still think it may be just out of Harriet’s reach this year, but I would love to be eating my words this time next week!
The 2009 Island Games will see a welcome return to the team of very talented all-round athlete Hollie Bass, who will be taking part in the event for the 4th time. Hollie debuted as a 16 year old in the 2001 Games on the Isle of Man, when she finished 5th in the 400m and 7th in the High Jump. 2 years later in Guernsey she was 5th in the High Jump (missing out on a share of the bronze medal on ‘countback’) and 6th in the 400m. The real success in Guernsey came in the relays, where Hollie was part of the team that won the silver medal in the 4x400m, and a memorable gold medal in the 4x100m along with Hannah Riley, Sarah Dowling and Rachel Croft.
By 2005, Hollie was expected to confirm her status as joint IOM High Jump record holder by claiming her first individual Island Games medal in Shetland, and she did just that by winning the bronze with a jump of 1.60m. She followed this up with a good 5th place in the Long Jump, and once again ran extremely well in the relays. She helped the team to the silver medal in the 4x100m, and was in the 4x400m team that was unfortunately disqualified after finishing 3rd.
Following the 2005 Games, Hollie took a break from athletics to concentrate on her studies in the UK. She appeared in occasional events over the next 3 years but was not in contention for the 2007 Games. Following her return to the island to work, Hollie started training seriously again last year, spurred into action partly by losing her IOM High Jump joint record to the then 13 year old Reagan Dee. She worked hard over the winter, and her excellent form in the High Jump at the start of 2009 clinched her selection for the Games. She will also be competing in the Long Jump, and is a reserve for the 4x100m relay team. Hollie is desperately anxious to beat her 7-year-old pb of 1.61m in the High Jump in Aland. If she can do that then she has a real chance of standing on an Island Games podium again.
Hollie appears to be really enjoying her athletics this year, and I don’t think we have seen the best of her yet. The emergence of several extremely talented young female high jumpers recently suggests that it is an event that the Isle of Man has the potential to dominate over the next few Island Games. Hollie will have to work really hard and literally ‘raise the bar’ over the next few years if she is to be part of it, but the people who know far more about high jumping than I do all think she is immensely talented. The rest is up to her!
The most experienced and most decorated member of the IOM team is Sarah Dowling, who has taken part in each of the last 4 Island Games, winning a total of 5 medals. She is also the only member of the 2009 team to have previously won an Island Games gold medal in an individual event. Sarah is best known for her sprinting, but in 1999 she just missed out on selection for the High Jump in Gotland, having achieved the guideline after the team had been selected. She made her Island Games debut on the Isle of Man in 2001 and performed creditably, finishing 7th in the 100m and 9th in the High Jump.
The highlight of Sarah’s athletics career to date came in Guernsey in 2003. She won the silver medal in the 100m in a controversial race that had to be re-run the following day after the original final descended into farce. The recall gun had failed after a false start, and many of the competitors ran almost the full 100m! Things only got better from there. She was part of the famous ‘Golden Girls’ team in the 4x100m relay, and capped this the following day by winning the gold medal in the 200m Final. It was a great reward for both Sarah and her long-time coach Di Shimell. Sarah selflessly sacrificed a 4th medal by giving up her place in the 4x400m relay to a teammate. By the 2005 Games in Shetland the depth of quality in the women’s sprints had increased, and although Sarah ran just as quickly as in 2003 she was only able to finish 5th in the 200m and 7th in the 100m. As usual she was a vital member of the relay teams, winning the silver medal in the 4x100m relay. Unfortunately the team was disqualified after finishing 3rd in the 4x400m relay.
Sarah’s 4th Games in Rhodes in 2007 saw another increase in standards in her events, and despite running a faster time than her 2003 gold medal winning performance, she was eliminated in the 200m heats by a fraction of a second. The winner of her heat went on to reach the 200m final in the World Athletics Championships in Osaka a few weeks later! By now Sarah had moved up to the 400m, and did really well to reach the final in which she finished 6th. She guided her young teammates to the bronze medal in the 4x100m relay and 4th place in the 4x400m relay.
After the final event in Rhodes, Sarah was interviewed on Manx Radio and pledged that she and the team as a whole would work really hard over the following 2 years to come back stronger in 2009. As always, Sarah has led by example and has done just that. She is now in arguably the best form of her career, having taken a sizeable chunk off her 400m pb and showing impressive speed in the shorter sprints too. She is entered in the 200m, 400m and both relays in Aland, and will challenge strongly in them all.
Sarah is a wonderful ambassador for her sport, liked and respected by all, and her approach to athletics makes her a great role model especially for the younger athletes in her training group. She puts a lot back into the sport, not least by organising many of her club’s trips away to the UK. Sarah is engaged to fellow Island Games gold medalist John Halligan, and this Friday will mark a significant milestone for them – it will be exactly a year until their wedding!
2 days to go for the team – and a day and a half for me…
The final 3 athletes to be featured in the pre-event build-up are the most experienced Island Games competitors in the women’s team. They will be competing in their 3rd, 4th and 5th Island Games respectively, and between them they already have a total of 11 medals – 3 individual ones and 8 in relay events.
Many of the team have improved greatly over the past year or so, but few more so than 19 year old sprinter Harriet Pryke. She has always been a very natural athlete and she achieved great success as a youngster, being selected for the Commonwealth Youth Games in Australia in 2004 when she was only 14. She made her Island Games debut in Shetland the following year, when she was the youngest member of the team. She did really well to get into the finals of both the 100m and 200m, finishing 8th and 6th respectively. She was part of the silver medal winning 4x100m relay team, and was denied a bronze medal in the 4x400m relay when the team was disqualified.
The Rhodes Games in 2007 were a little disappointing for Harriet in the individual events, as she was eliminated in the heats of the 200m and 400m, the latter event being fairly new to her at that stage. The real drama came in the 4x100m Relay Final when Harriet, running the anchor leg, was obstructed by Guernsey’s 3rd leg runner who collapsed in a heap in front of her after handing over to her teammate. Thankfully Harriet’s great agility and lightning reflexes enabled her to hurdle the human obstacle in her path, but she had lost a lot of ground. Undeterred, she recovered her bearings to produce a storming run that hauled the team back into the bronze medal position – a great performance.
After 2 or 3 difficult years when she didn’t really build on her early great promise for a number of reasons, Harriet’s athletics career has been transformed since she started at London’s Brunel University last year. A combination of University life, a top coach, high quality training partners and a lot of very hard work have done wonders, and Harriet has rapidly developed into a really outstanding senior athlete. Her improvement this year in the 400m, now her specialist event, has been quite incredible. Last weekend she won the silver medal in the Northern U20 Championships in a time of 56.92 – at the start of 2009 her pb was 60.2! She is presently ranked in the top 20 in the UK in the Under 20 age group.
Harriet is entered in the 200m, 400m and both relays in Aland, and has a really great chance of success in them all. I ventured the opinion in a recent entry on the blog that Julie Harrison’s Island Games 400m record of 55.1, set in 1995, should be safe for another 2 years. I still think it may be just out of Harriet’s reach this year, but I would love to be eating my words this time next week!
The 2009 Island Games will see a welcome return to the team of very talented all-round athlete Hollie Bass, who will be taking part in the event for the 4th time. Hollie debuted as a 16 year old in the 2001 Games on the Isle of Man, when she finished 5th in the 400m and 7th in the High Jump. 2 years later in Guernsey she was 5th in the High Jump (missing out on a share of the bronze medal on ‘countback’) and 6th in the 400m. The real success in Guernsey came in the relays, where Hollie was part of the team that won the silver medal in the 4x400m, and a memorable gold medal in the 4x100m along with Hannah Riley, Sarah Dowling and Rachel Croft.
By 2005, Hollie was expected to confirm her status as joint IOM High Jump record holder by claiming her first individual Island Games medal in Shetland, and she did just that by winning the bronze with a jump of 1.60m. She followed this up with a good 5th place in the Long Jump, and once again ran extremely well in the relays. She helped the team to the silver medal in the 4x100m, and was in the 4x400m team that was unfortunately disqualified after finishing 3rd.
Following the 2005 Games, Hollie took a break from athletics to concentrate on her studies in the UK. She appeared in occasional events over the next 3 years but was not in contention for the 2007 Games. Following her return to the island to work, Hollie started training seriously again last year, spurred into action partly by losing her IOM High Jump joint record to the then 13 year old Reagan Dee. She worked hard over the winter, and her excellent form in the High Jump at the start of 2009 clinched her selection for the Games. She will also be competing in the Long Jump, and is a reserve for the 4x100m relay team. Hollie is desperately anxious to beat her 7-year-old pb of 1.61m in the High Jump in Aland. If she can do that then she has a real chance of standing on an Island Games podium again.
Hollie appears to be really enjoying her athletics this year, and I don’t think we have seen the best of her yet. The emergence of several extremely talented young female high jumpers recently suggests that it is an event that the Isle of Man has the potential to dominate over the next few Island Games. Hollie will have to work really hard and literally ‘raise the bar’ over the next few years if she is to be part of it, but the people who know far more about high jumping than I do all think she is immensely talented. The rest is up to her!
The most experienced and most decorated member of the IOM team is Sarah Dowling, who has taken part in each of the last 4 Island Games, winning a total of 5 medals. She is also the only member of the 2009 team to have previously won an Island Games gold medal in an individual event. Sarah is best known for her sprinting, but in 1999 she just missed out on selection for the High Jump in Gotland, having achieved the guideline after the team had been selected. She made her Island Games debut on the Isle of Man in 2001 and performed creditably, finishing 7th in the 100m and 9th in the High Jump.
The highlight of Sarah’s athletics career to date came in Guernsey in 2003. She won the silver medal in the 100m in a controversial race that had to be re-run the following day after the original final descended into farce. The recall gun had failed after a false start, and many of the competitors ran almost the full 100m! Things only got better from there. She was part of the famous ‘Golden Girls’ team in the 4x100m relay, and capped this the following day by winning the gold medal in the 200m Final. It was a great reward for both Sarah and her long-time coach Di Shimell. Sarah selflessly sacrificed a 4th medal by giving up her place in the 4x400m relay to a teammate. By the 2005 Games in Shetland the depth of quality in the women’s sprints had increased, and although Sarah ran just as quickly as in 2003 she was only able to finish 5th in the 200m and 7th in the 100m. As usual she was a vital member of the relay teams, winning the silver medal in the 4x100m relay. Unfortunately the team was disqualified after finishing 3rd in the 4x400m relay.
Sarah’s 4th Games in Rhodes in 2007 saw another increase in standards in her events, and despite running a faster time than her 2003 gold medal winning performance, she was eliminated in the 200m heats by a fraction of a second. The winner of her heat went on to reach the 200m final in the World Athletics Championships in Osaka a few weeks later! By now Sarah had moved up to the 400m, and did really well to reach the final in which she finished 6th. She guided her young teammates to the bronze medal in the 4x100m relay and 4th place in the 4x400m relay.
After the final event in Rhodes, Sarah was interviewed on Manx Radio and pledged that she and the team as a whole would work really hard over the following 2 years to come back stronger in 2009. As always, Sarah has led by example and has done just that. She is now in arguably the best form of her career, having taken a sizeable chunk off her 400m pb and showing impressive speed in the shorter sprints too. She is entered in the 200m, 400m and both relays in Aland, and will challenge strongly in them all.
Sarah is a wonderful ambassador for her sport, liked and respected by all, and her approach to athletics makes her a great role model especially for the younger athletes in her training group. She puts a lot back into the sport, not least by organising many of her club’s trips away to the UK. Sarah is engaged to fellow Island Games gold medalist John Halligan, and this Friday will mark a significant milestone for them – it will be exactly a year until their wedding!
2 days to go for the team – and a day and a half for me…
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