Czechia’s Vlad Tulacek makes light work of winning at heavies at St Andrews Highland Games
A Czech and a Canadian were among the winners at this year’s St Andrews Highland Games on Sunday.
Czechia’s Vlad Tulacek notched up five wins and two second places in the day’s heavy events.
The former were for throwing a 16lb stone 49ft 2in, a 22lb stone 41ft 3in, a 16lb hammer 132ft 8in, a 56lb weight over a bar 16ft 3in high and for caber-tossing.
Falkirk’s Kyle Randalls was runner-up in the first four of those events but turned the tables with a 22lb hammer-throw of 112ft 7in and a 28lb weight-throw of 73ft 8in, with Tulacek finishing second, short by almost 3ft in both.
Dumbarton’s Craig Winslow and Czechia’s Tomas Suchopar were joint runners-up at caber-tossing.
Canada’s Ron and Sarah Loewen were first and second respectively in Sunday’s 3,200m race, with the former, named as senior athlete of the day, winning in a time of 10 minutes and 2.97 seconds from a mark of 150m, but the lion’s share of the athletics trophies on offer ended up in the Borders, with five going to Kelso’s Adie Gray Running School and three to Hawick runners.
The former’s winners were Colin Bruce over 90m and 400m, clocking 9.62 seconds from a 22m mark and 51.09 seconds from 82m; Douglas Young over 200m, in 21.44 seconds from 15m; Lucy Welsh in the youths’ 200m, in 22.34 seconds from 53m; and Martha Davies-Walker in the girls’ 800m, in 2:05.65 from 220m.
Hawick’s winners were Craig Watson in the 800m open, in 1:51.04 from 145m; Greg Walker over 1,600m, in 4:16.60 from 185m; and Greg Watson, also named as youth athlete of the day, in the youths’ 1,600m, in 4:52.06 from 150m.
The day’s two other races, a 90m sprint for youths and a boys’ 800m, were won by Clydesdale’s Eilidh Haggerty, in 10.32 seconds from 13.5m, and Kirriemuir’s Jack Kidd, in 1:45.69 from 170m, respectively.
Perth’s Paul Anderson won three cycling races – over 1,600m in 2:47.57 from 140m, over 3,200m in 6:23.59 from 150m and a De’il-take-the-hindmost challenge – and Pitlochry’s Mike Grunert finished first in the other, over 800m, in 1:13.88 from 130m.
Fife’s only winner was junior shot-putter and caber-tosser Murray Robb, of Saline, with a throw of 37ft 8in in the former and jointly with Glenisla’s Rowan Hart in the latter.