With many of our athletes away this weekend the final YDL for the younger age group saw us finish 4th on Saturday which means we will have slipped to 3rd in the league this year which is a little disappointing but still a great effort when you consider that 3 of the 4 meetings have been so far away.
However those athletes who were there did us proud as usual. There were many PBs on the day (see full results below) and a new club record! There was a great team spirit with many of the girls filling in events they would not normally compete at. This started last week when another U15 hammer thrower was needed. Amanda kindly put on a training session and Annaleise Kerswill & Mia Franklin both gave it a try. Annaleise went on to compete in the A string on Saturday and finished 4th which was a great achievement and also gain a PB in the javelin. We had a couple of late injuries on the day which meant that Grace O’Connell stepped into the shot at the very last minute and threw a PB along with her 70m hurdles PB. Ciara Harrop agreed to run the 1500m on the day on top of her other events, finishing 3rd in the B string, Sarah Mitchell stepped in on the day to cover the 300m and Lily Crossley did the same in the Javelin late on. Abigail Royden stepped in to cover the relay. All these athletes agreed to do events over and above their normal ones, just to earn the team points. A big thanks to you all.
The other massive highlight came in the last race of the day in the 4x300m. The club record holding team of Erin Hughes, Katie Rothery, Maya Marriner & Keira Rose were running together for the first time in a couple of months. Whilst we thought they might have a chance of beating their own record set in May of 3:57.76, the weather was really hot and a couple of them are still returning from injury, so the main aim was just to win. Well just in case you had gone home by then, they did win…by about 100m in a new club record time of 2:51.4. This is a truly staggering performance and puts them 2nd in the national rankings. Big well done to all of you. Knocking 6 seconds off your own record is incredible.
The boys U15s team also had missing athletes and again some covered events they would not normally compete at on the day. Callum Featherstone competing not only in his standard 800m event but also covering the 300m (PB) and 4x300m. Similarly, Oli Rodwell covering many of the field events and achieving PBs in the hammer, javelin and shot. Luke Nash with PBs in the 300m and discus then going on to run the 4x300m. There were more outstanding performances from Harry Blake with PBs in the hammer, high jump and discus and strong performances as usual from Michael Uzozie who along with Luke Nash, running storming 3rd and 4th legs in the 4x300m relay legs to bring them to 2nd place. I’m sure both will go on to do amazing things when they go up to the U17 age group next year.
In the U13s Owen Rees run PBs in the 100m, 200m and long jump and there was also a PB for Cameron Isaac in the 200m. Daniel Hardy also with a high jump PB. Noah Ryan also achieve a PB in the 1500m. What is worth noting is that many of the U13s are first year athletes that will remain U13s next year so have done brilliantly in their first year of competition.
With thanks to Mark Rothery (girls team manager) and Alun Rodgers (boys team manager) for your reports and support throughout the season.
Full results here
Brighton 21-7-18 – Google Drive