Report by Jim Keech, Men's Masters Team Manager.

Due to facility non-availability at Sandy the first fixture on 4th May was moved to Milton Keynes at very short notice and all teams were pleased, and a big thank you to all involved in ensuring the event was successful.  It was great to see many friendly faces again, I won’t say old as the rules of the league insist on this as a condition of entry !!  We had some new faces doing track for the first time: Charlie Palmer and Steve Horton both finished with smiles and promises of doing it again.  Sadly we were hit by some late withdrawals. but with some sterling performances across the evening the team managed to finish in second place only 13 points behind Milton Keynes.

Saturday 4th June saw Bedford and County’s senior Men and Women host round 2 of the National Athletics League Championship (Fixture A). Following a reasonable result in a tough round 1 match at Chelmsford that left the club 13th out of the 16 teams in the league, there was a sense among many that Bedford had a point to prove in a match that would see them face all the teams that finished below them in the 2021 season, local rivals Peterborough and Nene valley, and last season’s Champions, Crawley.

Two Bedford & County members competed at the England U20 Decathlon Championships held at Bedford last weekend (28/29 May).

Returning from his medical studies in Canterbury and with limited training behind him, reigning English Schools Decathlon Champion Stephen Simmons performed remarkably well, finishing in 5^thplace having set two personal best performances and  being very close to his lifetime best in five of remaining eight events.