Sussex athletes were eager to take advantage of more competitions last weekend and managed to break records, despite the lack of competitions this season. Julia Machin (Brighton & Hove) set a World Masters high jump record and Tom Evans (Lewes) broke the Sussex half-marathon record at Antrim while many athletes at the Elevate Field Festival at Lewes notched up personal bests and top class marks.
Julia must surely be one of the most long active, consistent and high class athletes in the Country even allowing for time off to re-produce. Way back in 1994, when still one of the Bennett girl with the Epsom club Julia won the National High Jump title and she twice represented England at the Commonwealth Games in 1994 and again twelve years later in 2006.
She retained her Surrey qualification for several years after moving to Sussex where she has remained a teacher at Cardinal Newman School. Now with the Brighton & Hove club and a Sussex champion Julia cleared a remarkable 1.66m at Chelmsford to break the World W50 Masters record.
Lewes super star Tom Evans had to travelled to the Antrim Coast Half-marathon for his Sussex record and he became the first Sussex athlete to break 64 minutes for the distance and in a race, that was won by Mo Farah, he finished an excellent seventh in 63.15s.
In the same race Ross Skelton (Hy) finished tenth in a personal best of 64:47 which moves him up to third on the Sussex All-time list.
There were some excellent performances at the Elevate Field Festival at Lewes and luckily the blustery wind manged to stay below the legal limit.
The triple jump provided a series of fine performances with Crawley’s Italian Junior international, Mame Diarra Sow, who is still in the U20 age group topping 13m for the first time with a fine 13.08m, which is more than one metre in excess of the Sussex record, and a distance that only two British athletes have bettered this year, a really bright prospect.
In the same event local girl Livvy Connor, better known as a pole vaulter leapt 11.91m, which is third best amongst Southern athletes this year and she also long jumped a PB of 5.87m while another 13m jump came in the U20 men’s age group where Brighton & Hove’s Louis Goffin set an outdoor personal best of 13.59m.
In the U17 age group Massi Campbell-Brambilla Brighton & Hove leapt 12.89m and also long jumped 6.44m.
Lewes dominated the pole vault with U17 Amelia Hatchard coming out on top clearing 3.30m and club mates Ivy Spencer, U20, and Emily Oakden, U17, both clearing 3.20m and in the senior hammer throw Worthing’s Ben Hawkes again topped the 60 metre mark with a throw of 61.54.