Ian Kennedy reports
Piers Copeland’s busy schedule around Europe took him to Gothenburg in Sweden on Saturday 29 August. This time he was racing over 800m, and once again his fast finishing brought him another PB. Not only was it a personal best but his time of 1:46.24 saw him rise to the top of the UK South West Region ‘All Time’ rankings.
The race was won by GB’s Daniel Rowden with a PB, a terrific performance, as he’d missed all of the 2019 season. In second place was home favourite Andreas Kramer.
Piers’ late surge saw him nick third place from Filip Sasinek on the line. Sasinek had finished just ahead of Piers when they met recently in Poland on a night when the Czech broke a national record over 2000m.
Piers claimed some other big scalps in Gothenburg. Amongst them was 800m specialist Scot Guy Learmonth and Craig Engels the reigning USA National Champion over.
As well as 1:46.24 putting Piers top of the pile for the men’s UK South West Region All Time list, it also moves him up the U23 AT rankings ahead of Andrew Osagie. Osagie went on to make the 800m final at the London 2012 Olympics as a senior.
Piers was in action again on Wednesday 3 September, this time in Marseilles. In France he turned his attention to the 1500m, his favoured event. For a third consecutive race (all over different distances) he recorded a PB.
His new 1500m mark (3:39.50) from Marseilles moves him up to second ‘All Time’ in the UK 1500m South West list, the only person ahead of Piers is Canadian William Paulson who is connected to Stroud AC (although he hasn’t raced in the UK since 2016). Piers needs just another 0.15s to claim top spot.
