It was a tale of two weather fronts and the falling of a 40 year record that marked the weekend’s Sussex Track & Field Champs.
More than 500 athletes took part in over 700 events across the event at the K2, Crawley, which saw glorious sunshine on the Saturday and downpours on the Sunday.
One of these athletes was Under 15, Grace Tuesday. Her first event on Day One was the 1500m where she won gold and was just 0.25 outside the Championship record clocking 4:39.55.
The Lewes AC talent was obviously determined to better this and on the Sunday her sights were set on Melissa Rooney’s 1982 800m record of 2:15.2. As she entered the final 100m, she had a kick finishing the race in 2:14.49 – a time that ranks her second in the UK.
There were only three championship records across the weekend with one of the others also by a Lewes AC athlete. Gemma Tutton was outside her 2021 PB of 4.10, but her pole vault of 3.76m was enough to not only take the U20 women’s gold but also the CBP.
The third CBP was shared by four athletes – the Brighton & Hove AC U20/Senior Men’s 4x100m relay team who clocked 43.05 breaking previous record of 43.10, held by Arena 80.
Other athletes came close to records like Charlie Fisher (Brighton & Hove AC), who won the U15 boys 100m in 11.66 – 0.14 outside the record, whilst Layla Bowen (Brighton & Hove AC) leaped 10.19m in the triple jump coming close to the 10.27m record.
This year’s Championships marked the first major track and field event not under Covid regulations. Due to Covid, last year’s event was condensed into one day and held at Withdean, Brighton.
Crawley AC won the most individual gold medals this year, which included Timi Esan taking both U20M 100m and 200m titles for the second year running and Isabella Lehtinen winning a hat trick of gold in the 100mH, the 400mH and 200M.
It was Brighton & Hove AC who shone in the Minithon competition taking girls gold and silver and boys gold and bronze. For the Minithon, the U13s compete in three events (a run, jump and throw) across the day. Kira Dunford was the girls’ winner with 66 points and Louis Ashworth the boys with 53.
Staging the Champs take a lot of time, effort and hard work by many. A huge thank you to all the officials and volunteers who helped make this year’s event a huge success.
Full Results here