It's Smirnov nice!

Jun 14 2005 By Bill Mcguirk, The Evening Chronicle

For the second time in three days, overseas athletes took the spoils in two of the region's major events.

On Thursday, Kenya's Simon Tanui led the 4,000-strong field home in the Blaydon Race.

Over the weekend, when heavy thunderstorms threatened to halt proceedings in the ninth international combined events meeting at Hexham, Vitaliy Smirnov of Uzbekistan and Larissa Nesaporuk (Estonia) proceeded to beat the weather to win their respective decathlon and heptathlon competitions.

At last year's Hexham festival, Britain's Dean Macey managed to win the event and also gain qualification for the Athens Olympics.

However, this time round a strong overseas contingent meant the best British athletes could hope for was third place.

Of the 10 decathlon events, Smirnov managed to come out on top in five as he accumulated 7,644 points, 200 fewer than Macey's 2004 total.

Finland's Aki Heikkinen, who was hoping to qualify for this year's World Championships in his home country in August, pushed Smirnov all the way but, despite a huge javelin throw in the penultimate event of 66.42 metres, he eventually finished more than 200 points behind the Uzbekistan athlete.

Gateshead's John Stacey had an up-and-down two days - he produced a personal best in the shot putt - and finished on 6,053 points, his best-ever score, for 11th place.

As in the men's event, overseas athletes filled the top two places in the women's heptathlon, though with just the javelin and 800 metres to go it looked as though Trafford's Fiona Harrison would finish in second place.

However, after a disappointing javelin competition, the UK international decided to end it that point, leaving the way open for Irina Naumenko (Kazakstan) to finish in second place behind Nesaporuk.

RESULTS - Decathlon: 1 Vitaliy Smirnov (UZB) 7,644 (11.33/+1.6, 6.69/-0.7, 13.71, 1.93, 49.65, 14.91/+1.0, 43.32, 4.45, 61.21, 4:31.08); 2 Aki Heikkinen (FIN) 7,397 (11.45/+1.6, 7.00/-1.4, 13.87, 1.96, 51.50, 15.42/+1.0, 35.29, 4.55, 66.42, 4:51.80); 3 Ben Hazell (Basingstoke) 7,193 (AAA Champ) (11.65/+0.6, 6.42/-3.0, 13.10, 1.93, 50.06, 15.47/+1.3, 41.82, 4.05, 57.12, 4:29.83); 11 John Stacey (Gateshead) 6,053.

Heptathlon: 1 Larissa Nesaporuk (EST) 5,873 (14.11/+1.0, 1.75, 13.51, 25.57/+1.4, 5.73/-0.3, 48.60, 2:21.94); 2 Irina Naumenko (KAZ) 5,438 (14.46/+1.0, 1.72, 12.39, 25.43/+1.4, 5.60/0.0, 34.87, 2:20.84); 3 Kate Brewington (Havering) 5,041 (AAA Champ) (14.59/+1.0, 1.66, 11.32, 26.12/+1.4, 5.56/0.0, 32.50, 2:29.94).

U-20 decathlon: 1 Oliver McNeillis (Halesowen) 6,528 (AAA Champ) (10.95w/+2.4, 6.70/-1.4, 12.14, 1.87, 50.42, 14.91/+1.6, 31.34, 3.75, 37.04, 5:07.59).

U-20 heptathlon: 1 Catherine Holdsworth 5,005 (AAA Champ) (14.44/+1.4, 1.57, 10.47, 25.70/+0.5, 5.76/0.0, 31.14, 2:27.24).