Seven Reading AC athletes competed at the South of England Combined Events Championships at Lee Valley Athletics Centre on the 14th and 15th December.
Day one saw the start of the Heptathlon for Kevin Cranmer and Joe Frew who competed in the senior men and U17 age groups respectively. Unfortunately, Sammy Ball was still recovering from a recent injury he picked up whilst representing England at the Home Country Schools Combined Events, so he could not join them although he spectated trackside.
Both athletes started well as they ran PBs in the 60m and progressed well through the day with Joe getting another PB in the high jump at the end of the day.
Day one also saw the U17 women’s and U15 boys’ pentathlons. Georgina Ashby and Hollie Cranmer were both returning after long periods off the track and so were very nervous about their first pentathlon of this age group. Both Hollie and Georgina performed amazingly well overcoming hurdles that have caused them problems in the past to put together great scores for them to use as targets for their next competition.
Hal Rust-D'eye competed in the U15 boys pentathlon. This was Hal's first indoor pentathlon but you wouldn't have guessed it as he stormed through the field securing the silver medal in the final event, 800m, with an impressive PB to add to the 3 others he attained in the 60mH, long jump and high jump. Hal’s high jump was arguably the highlight of the day. Clearing 1.47 m, Hal jumped 20cm higher than his previous best.
Day two saw the conclusion of the heptathlons and the U15 girls’ pentathlon. Charlotte Ashby, Charlotte Bigmore and Annie Jonkers all represented Reading AC in their first ever U15 pentathlon. All three girls started the day perfectly with PBs in the 60mH. The PB tally continued to grow for all three with both Charlottes attaining PBs in the high jump and the shot put. Notwithstanding the shot is heavier than the previous age group, the girls still managed to beat their previous best distances.
Annie jumped big PBs in the long jump, just short of the 5m ‘milestone’ and it will surely not be long before that mark is reached. Annie finished the day with a huge twelve second PB in the 800m bringing her up to 6th in the overall competition standings in a very large field of athletes.
For Kevin and Joe, the second day again started well with Kevin hurdling just 0.06 seconds off his PB in the hurdles and Joe running the fastest time for his competition of 8.60 seconds.
In the pole vault again Kevin only marginally missed out on a PB with 3.53m and Joe vaulting an amazing 2.53m in his first ever competition in that discipline.
The 1000m brought their competition to an end with Kevin again just missing out on a PB by less than a second with a time of 3.03. Another first for Joe saw a time of 3 minutes exactly to secure the bronze medal for the championship.
Congratulations to all the athletes.
Report by Mike Dyer
