Several records came crashing down on the first day of the Sussex County Track and field championships at Crawley’s K2 Leisure centre on Saturday.
Apart for a headwind down the home straight conditions were pretty good but even so, most of the records, or more strictly, Championships best performances came in the throwing events rather than on the track.
They came early when Ben Hawkes from Worthing lofted a massive effort in the U17 hammer throw when he added ten metres to the five year old mark with a remarkable 71.97m which puts him an amazing ten metres clear of his nearest British rival this season.
Not satisfied with this later in the afternoon Hawkes attacked a thirty five year old discus CBP and became the first to top the fifty mark with 50.49m.
Also in the hammer throwing Mick Jones from Crawley failed to break his own seventeen year old record, which at 53 is understandable, but on his return to throwing he did regain his title with a fine throw of 62.39m which is the furthest ever thrown by a British 50 year old.
While this was going on we witnessed what was certainly the finest race of the day when the senior and under 20 400 metres were combined and as the runners entered the final straight, two seniors, Mandy Gault (Portsmouth) and Crawley’s Holly Turner were neck and neck with sixteen year old Amber Anning (Brighton & Hove), who was running up an age group to get the standard for the Commonwealth Youth Games later in the season.
It was the youngster who proved the stronger over the final 100 metres and she flashed across the line in a personal best of 54.88s, a qualifying standard and more than one second inside club mate Gaby Howell’s 56.07s seventeen year old CBP.
Anning also dragged senior champion, Gault, inside the nine year old CBP in 55.31s while Turner was also inside 56 seconds with 55.75s.
In the U15 girls shot putt Millie Noyce (Crawley) broke the year old CBP, with the new weight of implement, a fine effort of 11.69m while towards the end of the first day Scott Staples from Lewes bettered the U20 CBP with 58.35m.
Mick Jones was not the only veteran to be on top of his game on Saturday as county Masters Cross-country champion Howard Bristow (Brighton & Hove) took a large field, so large that for the first time ever at these Championships a split start was used, by the scruff of the neck shook it and romped clear to finish the length of the strait clear of club mate, Kevin Moore in 15:03.01. Not a CBP but a pretty impressive run.
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