With Cross Country season approaching its conclusion over the next month, Track and Field is beginning to come into focus again. This weekend saw an extremely busy schedule at both the English Athletics U20/U17/U15 and North East Indoor Championships.
England Athletics OPEN U20/17/U15 Indoor Championships
Hosted in Sheffield over 2 days of competition, this National Championship was open to anyone previously reaching the national age grade standard. We had 4 athletes taking part, Izabella Edinboro in U17 300m, Hugo Douglas-Reeves in U17 60m Hurdles, Thomas Hill in U17 Pole Vault and Rowan Steel in U15 800m. All have worked so hard to reach the qualifying standard and just appearing at the Championships is a massive achievement.
First up was Izzy Edinboro in her 300m heat, finishing 4th with an excellent new PB of 41.85 down from 42.01. This was just quick enough to qualify for the semi final. Izzy’s time was 16th fastest out of 25 competitors with 17 qualifying. You can do no more than achieve a PB performance in a Championship, but as is often the case when it comes to running multiple rounds on the same day or weekend, it usually takes all out effort to qualify, leaving less in the tank for future rounds. Izzy had to run again later the same day in her semi final, finishing in 42.80 this time. Just to put context into the level at National competition, 40:31 would have been required to reach the final. Well done Izzy!
Thomas Hill was competing in the U17 Pole Vault having already extended last season’s outdoor best of 3.70m to 4.00m indoor this season. Thomas had perfect clearances to 3.95m on the day, before 3 failures at what would have been a new PB of 4.05m. This was enough to secure an excellent Bronze medal on countback. The athlete in 4th had multiple failed attempts at lower heights before finally clearing 3.95m on his last attempt for a PB meaning he couldn’t snatch the podium place away from Thomas. The Gold and SIlver medallists both cleared 4.05m on their first attempt but failed 4.15m 3 times so he wasn’t too far away from the top step of the podium really. An excellent weekend Thomas!
Rowan Steel was next up in the U15 800m. After qualifying last season with a time of 2:07, Rowan is coming off the back of a strong but limited Cross Country season with several excellent performances in NEHL, North East and Northern Championships.
6 of the 9 athletes would go through to the final from the 2 heats. Rowan found himself alongside a familiar face with William Hapgood also running in heat 1. Will comes to train with Harriers during school holidays so I’m sure they had a pre-race chat! Rowan started well from the outside lane and dictated the pace for the first 550m with William tracking him all the way. William made a surge past Rowan with around 250m to go and looked strong heading to the finish. Rowan moved back into 3rd with 50m to go but hung on to clock a new PB of 2:06.55 in 3rd. This was enough to qualify 4th fastest of the 6 qualifiers. Great experience of leading a championship race for Rowan.
The final on Sunday saw a very quick race with Hapgood taking the title in a blisteringly quick 2:01.74, knocking over 3.25 seconds off his PB set in the heat! With other boys producing 2:03’s in the final it was always going to be tough for Rowan on tired legs, coming in 6th in 2:11.00. I know Rowan will be disappointed with that time, but he’ll learn a lot from the experience and I’m sure we’ll see him produce faster times as the season progresses.
Finally, Hugo got his competition started on Sunday afternoon in the 60m Hurdles. After one athlete was disqualified for a false start, the remaining 5 athletes got away safely, with Hugo 3rd to the first hurdle. He finished 4th in 8.73, 13th fastest from 19 finishers in the heats and 2nd of the 4 first year U17’s.
Hugo is a first year U17 at this level so not only facing older boys but also trying to get used to a new hurdle height which is more complicated than it sounds! He would have had to knock 0.09s off his PB to qualify, which is no mean feat in an event that is over in a blink of an eye! I’m sure he’ll benefit from this race going forwards, especially being able to use his endurance background to good effect with the increased race distances in outdoor hurdles.
North East Indoor Championships
We had so many athletes competing for North East titles this weekend! Many of whom competing in several events and in new age categories.
Beth Johnson probably wins the prize for most events entered, and she performed superbly in all! Achieving a 1cm PB in High Jump (1.21m), a 10cm PB in Long Jump (3.69m), 7.14m in Shot Put as well as running in two 60m Hurdles races, coming 3rd in her heat (10.67) and 4th in the final (10.66). I hope you’re having a well earned rest Beth!
Beth Sullock won her U20 60m heat in 8.11 with Libby Hammond 3rd in the same heat (8.33) – Both qualifying for the final. Beth then equalled her PB, finishing 3rd in the final with 8.10 and Libby 6th in 8.36. Extremely consistent performances over the two races. Libby also achieved 4.37m in the Long Jump.
Elizabeth Clay came 3rd in her U17 60m heat, running a PB of 8.35. This got her through to the final as a fastest none automatic qualifier, before coming 6th in the final (8.47).
Ashton Harrison became double U20 champ in Long Jump and Shot Put. His 5.55m was enough to take the crown by 22cm and he was the only U20 competitor in a mixed age Shot Put, throwing out to 10.06m for a PB.
Elsewhere in the Shot Put, Charlotte Rutter was 2nd Woman overall and 1st Senior Woman with 9.94m, also coming 4th in the Long Jump (4.79m). Tori Buckley came away as U20 champ after producing a 25cm PB of 9.35m in her first year at this age grade and Sarah Johnson was also 1st in the W40 category throwing 8.18m. Sarah was as busy as her daughter it seems, also achieving 1.31m in the High Jump, 8.51m in the Triple Jump and a new 60m Hurdles PB of 10.11 got her the age category win, knocking an amazing 0.33s off her previous best of 10.44!
In U17 Men’s Shot Put, Jack Wood was 4th with a great throw of 7.85m, increasing his PB from 7.15m and in the same competition, Joshua Davison took Silver with 9.33m, only 3cm outside his PB. Joshua also came 2nd in high Jump with 1.65m and 5th in Long Jump with 4.97m.
Another busy chap was Monty Bowden, arguably athlete of the day! Monty competed in 4 events, producing PB’s in all of them including two 1st’s and two 2nd’s. He was 2nd in High Jump, producing a 2cm PB of 1.35m and 2nd in 60m Hurdles taking a quarter of a second off his PB, running 12.25. If that wasn’t enough, he jumped 4.33m in the Long Jump (6cm PB) and 8.03m in the Shot Put to take the wins. I make that an improvement of 1.72m according to Roster, which is incredible if correct! (Please correct me if it’s wrong!)
Lucie Hammond was another to produce PB’s, jumping 3.40m in the Long Jump to finish 4th out of 8 and running 9.73 to finish 2nd in her heat, following that up with a faster run to win the B final in 9.62. Lucie also threw 5.41m in the shot, with her previous best 4.66m.
Lottie had been doing a little bit of Cross Country over the Winter, but today was all about the field events. 4.30m in the Long Jump and taking the U17 Shot Put title with a 15cm PB of 10.85m, winning the competition by 19cm. A great time to produce her best throw!
Karl Murray ran 10.98 in the 60m Hurdles to take Senior Men Gold and 8.03 in his 60m heat. Karl qualified for the final with that run, but didn’t start.
Fantastic performances by all competitors this weekend. Looking forward to seeing more of this during track and field season, especially after news of another couple of cancelled Cross Country events due to waterlogged grounds!
All PB information was taken from Roster so please do let me know if there are any errors!