IT was simply a tremendous weekend for Channel Islands athletics.
Jersey juniors Becky Slater and Simon Phelan won bronze medals in the javelin and high jump respectively in the English National Schools championships in Gateshead on Saturday - taking the overall medal tally to four, following the gold medal-winning performances of discus throwers Jamie Stevenson and Lauren Thérin on Friday.
And the Ansbacher CI men’s athletics team beat off the opposition to win their Southern League Division III match by just one point in competition on Saturday against teams from Bracknell, Hercules Wimbledon and Croydon, despite being without the juniors who were at Gateshead, Lee Merrien and Dale Garland who were competing in the Olympic qualifiers in Manchester, and the injured Peter Irving.
Athletics development officer Andrew Winnie said he was almost speechless with delight after the performances of the juniors.
‘It was absolutely tremendous,’ he said.
‘It was the best ever performance by Channel Islands junior athletes.
Becky’s javelin throw was a new personal best and Simon’s high jump, a 2.04m, was just outside his own PB of 2.07, but good enough on the day for bronze.’ Stephen Prosser finished in sixth place in the 100m for a place on the podium and Rebecca Duquemin was seventh in the discus competition.
Sophie Twinam was tenth in the high jump and Gemma Dawkins ran a good time in the 200m, although was knocked out in the heats.
‘It was the first time at these championships for Sophie and Gemma and they both performed well,’Winnie said.
Guernsey juniors Kylie Robilliard and Erica Bodman were also competing at Gateshead, with Robilliard crashing out of her heat - she was leading - after she hit the last hurdle and fel,l while Bodman went out in the high jump heats.
Masters athlete Alan Harrison was among the CI men competing in Berkshire.
He said: ‘There were a lot of people missing, and it was down to a good team effort to pick up the points as best we could with what was, more or less, half a team plus reserves.
The weather was pretty awful, with very blustery conditions, so the middle-distance men, Steve dawes and Lee Garland, did very well.
They competed in a number of long events, hard work in those conditions.
But overall, it was a case of the whole team grinding out the points, I don’t think there were any records broken!’ In Manchester, Guernsey athlete Dale Garland finished with a silver medal in the 400m hurdles, behind British medal prospect Chris Rawlinson.
Garland’s time was 51.1 sec, the qualifying time for the Olympics is 49.7 sec.
Article posted on 12th July, 2004 - 12.00am
Most Commented: