Last weekend saw two full days of action packed athletics when Sheffield’s English Institute of Sport hosted the Northern Athletics Indoor Championships. This event was just for the older athletes, with competitors from the Under 17, Under 20 and Senior age categories. DHAC had two of our most experienced juniors taking part; Charlotte Rutter and Liam Brittle, both from our Under 17 squad.
Although these were all individual events, all-rounder Charlotte was treating this as a good training session for a pentathlon. Over the two days she competed in five events; hurdles, long jump, high jump, shot, and where a normal pentathlon would finish with the 800m, Charlotte ran the 200m instead
Day 1 There were two events on the Saturday for Charlotte; the 60m hurdles and the long jump. She was in the second of three heats in the hurdles, up against some quality athletes, most of whom were a year older than her. But she pulled out all the stops with a cracking race, smashing her PB in the process to finish in 2nd place in a time of 9.11s! An excellent start to the day! Onto the final, against some of the North’s fastest hurdlers. Another top performance which also beat her old PB (but not quite as fast as the heat!) crossing the line in 6th place in a time of 9.20s. Well done Charlotte! The long jump promised to be an exciting event, with a field of 29 competitors, who’d been split into two groups – Charlotte was in the second group, the B Final. After some fierce competition and impressive jumping, she finished an excellent 2nd place out of her group with anotherPB of 4.94m! Getting closer to that 5.0m mark! Great stuff, Charlotte, a fantastic first day.
Day 2 There was a busy day ahead for Charlotte on the Sunday with the shot, high jump and 200m to contend with. The shot was never going to be easy, up against some real throws specialists, but great practice for the pentathlon! With a great effort from Charlotte, her best on the day was another PB and another milestone reached with a tremendous throw of exactly 9.0m! In the high jump, one of Charlotte’s favourite events, the 18 competitors were split into two groups of 8. Once again, she was up against athletes a year older than herself, but she battled on and in the end was happy with a season’s best of 1.45m; just 2cm off her PB. It was the first time Charlotte had competed in the 200m indoors. She was drawn in Heat 1 out of the 6 heats, so was up against some tough competition. It was a fantastic first effort, even though she found it ‘weird’ running round the bends on the banked track. She finally crossed the line in 5th place with a new PB of 27.49s, beating her best outdoor time as well! Unfortunately she just missed out on getting to the final, but a great run nonetheless.
I’m sure you’ll agree that was an outstanding performance from Charlotte, in all disciplines. A firm footing to start off the New Year, and one we’re confident she will improve on even further in the months ahead. Great work, Charlotte, well done!
It was great to see Liam Brittle back in action again in his first run of 2019. Today he was up against some quality athletes from the likes of Hallamshire, Preston and Sale Harriers at one of his favourite distances, the 800m. It was a tough race but Liam certainly held his own, finally finishing in 5th place in a time of 2:08.43, just over a second outside his PB. Incidentally, he ran the same race at the same meeting this time last year in a time of 2:13.62 so an excellent improvement on that. A fantastic effort, Liam, well done
