You may recall that three of our Junior Harriers were selected to compete at this year’s English Schools T&F Championships at Sportcity, Manchester. Charlotte Rutter was part of the Cleveland team, taking part in the Senior Girls 100m Hurdles, with Tori Buckley and Ashton Harrison both competing for Durham; Tori in the Junior Girls Shot Put and Ashton in the Junior Boys Triple Jump.
This year, due to Covid, each year group competed on different days, so it was Charlotte who was the first of our trio to compete on Friday 9th July. There were two heats in the 100m Hurdles and Charlotte was in Heat 2; a tough line up of four Year 1 athletes and four from Year 2, with Charlotte still in her first year as a ‘Senior.’ It was a close race which was the fastest of the two heats and as usual, a fantastic run from Charlotte, crossing the line with a new PB of 14.63s to take 5th place and qualification into the final. Once again, she was one of the younger athletes for the final, but Charlotte didn’t let that put her off; another excellent race finishing in 6th place, just a fraction off her PB with a time of 14.69s. Well done Charlotte, a superb performance!
Whilst Charlotte has competed at the English Schools finals before, this was the first time for Tori and Ashton so it was an exciting time for them both! As ‘Juniors’ they were competing on Sunday 11th July. There were some tough opponents for Tori; we know her as a multi-event athlete (like Charlotte and Ashton) and today she was up against some highly ranked, dedicated shot putters. But as usual she performed amazingly well with a best of 10.13m on the day to take 8th place. Impressive throwing, Buckers, well done! Likewise, more tough competition for Ashton in the Triple Jump, plus he’s only recently returned to competitive athletics after recovering from an injury. But he produced some cracking jumps, in fact his best on the day was a new PB of 11.10m which was enough to take 7th place. Terrific jumping, Ashton, well done!
So, huge congratulations to our three stars of the future! Just reaching the finals is a massive achievement in itself and something for all young athletes to aim for. So well done, Charlotte, Tori and Ashton; I hope you’re as proud of yourselves as we are of you!
Full results of the Championships can be seen at: –
https://www.thepowerof10.info/results/results.aspx?meetingid=417812&top=5000
THE GALLERY – photos courtesy of Claire Rutter, Gill Buckley, Andy Harrison, Simon Hannaford and Geoff Fenwick