Athletics: Half-marathon competitors impress off-Island

Several PB's across meetings in Barcelona and Wrexham

A selection of the Isle of Man's half-marathon competitors have impressed in off-Island competitions in the past few days.

There was a personal best and top-three finish secured by Caroline Mayers at the Barcelona Half Marathon on Sunday (16 February) as she was one of two local competitors taking part in the meeting along with Helen Taylor.

There were PB's also for husband and wife pairing Paul and Dawn Atherton on the same day during the Wrexham Half Marathon as both impressed in the Vet 40 categories.

At the Spanish event, Mayers' new personal becnhmark was also coupled with finishing third overall in the Female V50 class as the Manx Harriers athlete crossed the line in one hour, 27 minutes and 37 seconds.

Western AC's Taylor, meanwhile finished only just outside the top ten in that age group, clocking one hour, 37 minutes and 56 seconds to finish 12th in class.

Separately during the same meeting a new half-marathon world record was set by Uganda's Jacob Kiplimo with a time of 56 minutes, 42 seconds.

It shattered Yomif Kejelcha's previous world record (57 minutes, 30 seconds) record by 48 seconds.

On the same day in Wales, Paul and Dawn Atherton were the Western AC representatives across the male and female Vet 40 categories.

Dawn's time of one hour, 25 minutes and 22 seconds took more than a minute of her previous best personal benchmark to finish sixth in the class.

Paul took two seconds off his PB, recording one hour, 15 minutes 55 seconds to finish tenth in the male Vet 40.