Farringdon XC

A fantastic start to the cross country season at Farringdon! Lots of our endurance team pushing hard up the hills and working all the way to the finish line. Some great times and positions with Alistair placing 2nd in the U15s and George 2nd in the U17s.

Results
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ESAA Combined Events National Finals

Chelmsford was the location for the final track and field event of a long summer, with Senna Gorvett the sole representative for Northumberland after Luke Pichler's late withdrawal due to injury.

Competing in the senior girls heptathlon, Senna was looking to secure a top 10 finish amongst a field of 36 of the best multi-eventers in England.

Day 1 started with the hurdles, with Senna struggling into a strong headwind, and she was 1.5s down on her best. The high jump was an opportunity to move up the rankings, but again, Senna did not quite perform to her best and 1.53m kept her on the outer reaches of the top 10. Things started to change for the positive in the shot put, where Senna nailed a final round 9.03m, which was an outdoor PB. She finished the day with the 200m, which again was into a very strong headwind. The time wasn't great, but the performance was - leaving Senna 10th overnight.

Day 2 was cooler but provided sunshine and a favourable wind. Senna made the most of it in the long jump, again saving her best till last as she leapt to 5.19m, her best ever within a heptathlon. a 26m javelin throw kept the pressure on, and Senna headed into the 800m in 10th place, but with opportunity to move up. Senna ran a fantastic 800m, with excellent pace judgement and a strong finish to finish 2nd in her heat in a seasons best 2:31.36s. This was enough to move Senna up to 8th place overall, a fantastic result in her first year in age group.

Whilst in Chelmsford, Senna was also signed off by her assessor as a qualified Assistant Coach! We look forward to seeing Senna begin her coaching journey.

Great North Run Weekend
Fantastic to see so many of our young athletes flying across the bridges of the Tyne for the Junior Great North Run. We had many taking part in the mini and the junior races with some outstanding performances and even bigger smiles! Well done to everyone that took part and every parent that got left behind! 

Huge well done to Alistair Johnson for completing the Great North 5k on the friday night with an amazing time of 16:56, a massive club record!

A weekend of GNR celebrations continues with Harrison Craik taking on the full 13.1 miles! 🤯 He did amazing and we are all very proud! 

Sprint Relays
On Wednesday 3rd September, we participated in the annual Sprint Relays at Monkton Stadium. It was an up and down evening, with our teams usual exceptional baton changes deserting many of our teams, as we suffered 3 dropped batons! However, there were still plenty of fantastic completed races across the age groups, with our U15 Girls faultless throughout as they took 1st in the U15 4x100, helping the team to 5th place overall finish.

NECAA Pentathlon
As the track and field season draws towards a close, it was great to see 7 of our young athletes giving it their all in the NECAA Pentathlon at Monkton Stadium on the 13th September.

U13 Boys
Alex and Harry proved a formidable team, as they were involved in a high quality U13 boys competition. Alex returned from injury in fine style, and despite far from ideal conditions set a new pentathlon PB of 1753pts to take a fantastic gold.  Harry Ross produced a fine debut outdoor pentathlon, including PB's in the high jump and 800m. He was sitting in a medal position right through until the final moments, where he was just pipped to bronze.

U15 Girls
India Gorvett built a fantastic pentathlon, despite a few tricky moments. A strong 800m was a highlight as she finished in a fine 4th place, just a tiny margin away from a podium finish.  Just being India was Safia in 5th, as she made a stunning pentathlon debut outdoors. She set massive PB's in the hurdles, high jump, shot put and 800m on what was a fantastic day for Safia. It was also a debut pentathlon for Charlotte Hartley - and she also shined, with PB's in the shot put and 800m on her way to a score of 1692pts.  Fearne Bell produced a stunning series of performances, including a new long jump PB of 4.20m, as she looked on course for a medal. However, an ankle injury resulted in an 800m DNF, but Fearne should be proud of her performance. Kimi Ng had a great day, with PB's in the hurdles, shot put and 800m as she set a massive overall pentathlon PB of 1637pts to finish the season in style!

Lesley Little Memorial Competition
A great day for Ben Compton at Sheepmount stadium in Carlisle. It was the Lesley Little memorial Charity Competition for Liver North. Ben's first competition of the day was his first time throwing the 5Kg hammer as a u15 using the U17 weight. He got 40m32, a PB and a club record for under 15 throwing a 5kg hammer. Then his second competition of the day was U15 boys 4Kg hammer, Ben got first U15 boy with 45m29 to retain the memorial shield for U15 boys.

Sadie Parker received an invite to compete in last weekends Manchester International, which was a World Athletics Challenger event, and drew a top class international field. 

In the long jump, she went up against the very best from the home countries, however was not quite able to find the board accuracy that she wanted. Nonetheless, her best of 5.66m was enough for 5th place, and 1st U20. The weather then turned for the worse, and heavy rain awaited for the 100m Hurdles. Sadie was involved in a head-to-head against 2018 Commenwealth Heptathlon medalist Niamh Emerson - what an opportunity for Sadie! She made a sensational start, getting to the first hurdle in a clear lead, which she mainained to hurdle 3 befor Niamh Emerson came through to win. Sadie was rewarded with a legal PB of 15.03 (+1.4m/s).

At the final NOTAN Summer Grand Prix, there were fine performance from our young team. Harris, Noah, Jack and Alex all gave it their all in the sprint, endurance run, long jump and howler throw.

Its fantastic to see them developing their multi-event skills. Full results are below.

Finally for this update, Hollie-Anne Sudder travelled to York, and took the U17 200m in a strong headwind.

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