2017 Northern Under 15 & Under 17 Track & Field Championships

Leigh Sports Village – Saturday 19th/Sunday 20^th August

Twenty one of Kingston’s junior athletes journeyed over the Pennines to the Leigh Sports Village to compete at the 2017 Northern track & field championships which were held on the weekend of 19^th and 20^th of August. A fair number of them travelled with real hopes of winning a medal and others were looking to improve on past performances and hopefully get a podium place and five of the athletes were making their debut appearances at a major championship meeting.

There were some outstanding performances from the young Kingston athletes both on the track and in the field and between them they brought a tally of 14 medals back to Costello 5 gold, 5 silver and 4 bronze and five of them returned home as Northern Champions.

Under 15 Ben Copley had another great weekend winning two gold medals and one silver, the silver came in the shot putt where the UK ranked No. 15 threw a PB of 13.10 metres, in the discus the reigning champion and English Schools champion and UK No. 1’s throw of 47.91 metres secured him the gold medal and his second gold was won in the javelin where the UK No. 4 launched out a throw of 51.82 metres. The next competition for Ben are the England Championships down in Bedford.

Adam Coles was the gold medallist in the under 17 mens 100 metre hurdles winning his first Northern title after finishing 2^nd in the under 15’s 80 metre hurdles in 2015 and 2^nd in the under 17’s 100 metre hurdles in 2016. He was also in competition in the long jump final where he missed the bronze medal by only 4 centimetres, losing out on the last jump of the competition.

In the triple jump an effort of 11.55 metres by Libby Wheeler won her a first Northern outdoor title to add to the triple jump gold medal in the same age group at January’s indoor championships, it has been another excellent season for Libby who was the triple jump bronze medallist at February’s England indoor championships and made a clean sweep of the long jump and triple jump titles at County level. As with her training partner Adam Coles she too missed a bronze medal by 4 centimetres in the under17 womens long jump final. The next competitions on Libbys radar are the England Championships at Bedford followed 7 days later by the UK School games in Loughborough where she has been selected to represent Northern England.

In the under 17 mens hammer the 2015 and 2016 under 15’s champion Shaun Kerry took his 3^rd consecutive hammer gold and his first at under 17 securing the gold medal with his throw of 54.71 metres. He also competed in the shot and javelin events where took 5^th place in both of the finals. Like Libby Shaun has also been selected for the Northern England team and his next two competitions are at the National Championships and the UK School Games

In the Under 17 mens long jump the 2015 English Schools champion Jack Perry who has had some terrible luck with injuries over the last two seasons which have put him out of action for many months was back in the running and back in the hunt for medals, the County champion who didn’t find his best form at this competition put in a solid jump of 6.16 metres to take the silver medal.

Northern indoor combined events champion Venus Morgan won the bronze at last years championship meeting and this year she improved on that result taking the silver medal in the under 17 womens 80 metre hurdles she won her heat in a time of 11.87 sec and clinched 2^nd place in the final with her run of 12.01 sec. The multi-eventer also competed in the 100 metres, long jump and shot taking a top 8 finish in all of them showing the all round ability of a heptathlete.

The County and County schools champion Harriet Cannell had finished in 5^th place on her debut appearance at the 2016 Northern championships and she was looking to improve on that performance and that is exactly what she did, this year she was the silver medallist in the under 17 womens javelin final where she launched a throw of 38.02 metres. The 2016 under 15’s champion Becky Chivers missed out on a bronze medal this year by just one centimetre in her first year in the under 17’s with her throw of 35.97 metres and the County and County Schools bronze medallist Paige Mathers threw a new PB of 32.89 metres for 7^th place an increase of 2.46metres on her previous best.

Alanah Thoresby The County Schools champion and County silver medallist was in action in the high jump where she won the silver medal with a clearance at a height of 1.55 metres she only lost out on winning the title on count back she had one failure at an earlier height compared with the winners clean sheet and Ellie Townsend who was a joint silver medallist with Alanah at the County Championships took 5^th place with her clearance at a height of 1.45 metres.

Sam Croney was the bronze medallist in the under 17 mens 100 metre hurdles final where he ran a new PB of 14.81 sec clipping 0.56 of a second off his old time. This was Sam’s second bronze medal in two years at Northern Championship meetings following his 3^rd place in last years under 15’s 80 metres final and in February 2016 he had taken the bronze over the 60 metre hurdles at the Northern indoor championships.

The Yorkshire No 1 ranked 200 metres runner Brody Hinson was the silver medallist at this years Northern indoor championships and was a finalist at Julys English Schools championships, he also made a clean sweep of the sprint medals at the Northern inter Counties plus the County and the County Schools events. He was the winner of his heat in the under 15 boys 200 metres where he clocked 23.85 sec and in the final he was the bronze medallist running a time of 24.04 sec.

Jess Townsend was making her Northern track & field debut at this meeting and she competed in the under15 girls discus an event that has seen her making good progress this year, she was the silver medallist at the County championships in May and she backed that up with a bronze medal at the Northerns where she threw the discus out to a distance of 24.25 metres.

Antony Mould was another athlete making his Northern track & field debut at Leigh and the 2017 County and County schools hammer champion was the bronze medallist in the under 15 boys hammer where he threw a distance of 32.44 metres, he was also in action in the discus final taking 5^th place with his throw of 25.42 metres.

Double County sprints champion Hannah Kynman was in action in the under 17 womens 100 metres and the 2015 silver medallist safely negotiated the heats winning heat 1 in a time of 12.69 sec, the 100 metres final saw Hannah take a 4^th place finish with her run of 12.64 sec.

Daisy Logan has been training with Kingston since November of last year and has been making good progress throughout the track & field season she won the County 100 metres title in May and was selected for the County team for July’s Inter Counties meeting. She made her Northern championship debut at Leigh in the under 15 girls 100 and 200 metres competitions. Drawn in heat 1 she ran a new PB of 13.34 sec a quarter of a second below her old time which took her into the second of the semi finals where she ran another PB of 13.30 sec but it wasn’t enough to progress to the final. The 200 metres saw Daisy Logan qualify for the final running a new PB of 27.29 sec in heat 1clipping 0.22 of a second off her old time and she ran faster in the final where she took 8^th place shaving 6 hundredths of a second for a new PB of 27.23 sec. She made the final of the 200 metres and the semi final of the 100 as a first year under 15 in her first year in the sport an impressive performance.

In the under 15 girls 800 metres the 2016 silver medallist Jodie Martin qualified for the final from heat 2 where she ran a time of 2:25.31 sec  the County Schools champion finished in 7^th place in the final and she covered the two lap race in a time of 2:31.19 sec. The under15 boys 800 metres saw Callum Featherstone making his Northern championship debut he has been training with the club since the spring of 2016 and he has been coming on well this year and has taken more than 9 seconds off his PB. His run of 2:21.20 sec in the final saw him take a 9^th place finish.

Paige Mathers was in competition in the in the under 17 womens 80 metre hurdles and drawn in heat 1 she qualified for the final clocking a time of 13.89 sec and Paige’s run of 14.14 sec in the final saw her take a 7^th place finish.

The under 15 girls long jump final saw Alanah Thoresby, Ellie Townsend and Emily Dye in competition the athletes were split into an ‘A’ and a ‘B’ pool. Emily took 11^th place in the ‘A’ pool with her jump of 4.50 metres and in the ‘B’ Alanah finished 6^th with 4.40 metres and Ellie 7^th with 4.30 metres. Emily Dye also ran in the heats of the 75 metres hurdles where her time of 14.13 sec wasn’t enough to make the final.

Thrower Indigo Atkin was the Shot bronze medallist at Februarys Northern indoor championships and she was the hammer gold medallist and shot silver medallist at the County Schools championships, she was in action in shot, hammer and javelin at Leigh taking 4^th place in the hammer with a throw of 33.44 metres, 12^th place in the shot with a putt of 8.66 metres and 12^th in the javelin where she threw a seasons best of 22.61 metres.