Oct 2008 - Morrison's Academy

Athletics/Swimming/Cricket
Girls’ Athletics (cont.)
events Rachel won the 800m with
Catherine Lovegrove in second. The
hurdles race was also won by Rachel
with Melanie Stephen finishing
second. In the field events Rachel
won the long jump with a jump of
4.69m and in second place with a
jump 4.04m was Melanie Stephen.
The shot putt was won by Emily
Harrison, discus by Ailsa Laird and the
javelin by Meggan Redden. Rachel
Adamson won by a margin but the
number of girls who contested the
events, especially the field events, was
pleasing.
In the senior girls championship Vicky
Henderson, who is also the girls’
athletic captain, won the
championship easily. She took first
place in the 100m, 200m, 300m, 800m
and the shot putt and second in the
discus. This gave her a total of 38
points. Her closest rival was Victoria
Tripp who finished on 18 points. She
did get the better of Vicki Henderson
in the discus with a throw of 17.03m.
Two events which did not involve
either of these girls were the javelin
and the long jump. In the javelin, Ailsa
Guntley won with a throw of 15.34m
with Claire Beattie in second with her
throw of 13.34m. The long jump was
extremely close between Kate
Kennedy and Katherine Harris. In the
end Kate won with a jump of 3.87m,
only 2cm better than Katherine. This is
when it is vital to take off right on the
board.
Overall sports’ day was a huge
success. The rain stayed away, the
girls competed in a friendly
competitive manner and there were
plenty of vocal spectators who
added to the atmosphere of the day.
D Nesbit
Swimming
The Morrison’s swim team has enjoyed
some success this season, although
individual opportunities for many of
our swimmers were at times limited by
pupil unavailability and illness. That
said, we were able to field four
swimmers at the Tayside Schools’
Swimming Championships at the
Olympia Centre in Dundee in
November. The standard of
competition is always very high with
the majority of entrants being Club
level swimmers.
Jemma Murphy (12 & under - 50m
backcrawl and 50m freestyle) and
Sam Rowley (13/14 years – 100m
breaststroke) competed well in their
respective events although sadly
failed to qualify for their finals. Both
swimmers showed a lot of promise for
the future and I look forward to seeing
them compete again next year.
Medal success did, however, fall on
Morrison’s swimmers with Jamie
Duncan winning bronze in the boys’
15/16 years 100m breaststroke and
Josh Murchie runner-up in the 13/14
years 100m breaststroke.
In our regular swim match versus
Glenalmond College we were
fortunately able to field a strong team
made up of pupils from S1 – S6. Both
the U15 and O15 boys’ teams left it
right to the last race to take victory in
two closely fought freestyle relays.
Fine performances over the course of
the afternoon came from Nathan
Thomson in the U15 50m backcrawl;
Josh Murchie in the U15 50m
breaststroke; Graeme Clow in the 25m
butterfly and John Ramsay in the 50m
freestyle. The girls’ competition was
equally as hard fought with our U15
girls winning by only two points. Sami
Murchie and Lauren Houston
produced fine wins in the 50m
freestyle and the 50m breaststroke
Sport The Morrisonian | 07/08 Page 71
respectively. The O15 girls ably
captained by Ellie Wagstaff were,
however, unlucky to lose out to
Glenalmond, particularly after
success for Ailsa Laird in the 25m fly
and Ellie in 25m breaststroke. My
thanks go to all those swimmers
who represented the school in this
match.
In our own school swimming
championships, Ellie Wagstaff
became senior girls champion while
Ailsa Laird was victorious in the
intermediate girls’ event. The senior
and intermediate boys’
championships were won by John
and Paul Ramsay respectively.
E McCormack
1st XI Cricket
Last year I wrote: “We did not really
see the best of what had been a
promising team. Several return next
year and we hope for better weather
to give us the chance to fulfil the full
fixture list.”
Well this turned out to be a season of
immense frustration – there looked to
be a good mix of experience and
youthful enthusiasm along with talent
in both batting and bowling. However
for a mixture of reasons this team was