3 UK indoor champions
Woodford athletes enjoyed great success at the UK athletics indoor championships in Birmingham. WGEL members won seven medals, the most of any club at the event, including titles for Will Grimsey, Mary Elcock and Cindy Sember.
First up on Saturday were the 60m sprinters, including Eugene Amo-Dadzie and U20 champion Medwin Odamtten. The championships is also the trials for the European indoor championships, but the mens 60m had 8 competitors with the qualifying standard (6.63) already, more than in all the other men’s events combined. Eugene (6.65) and Medwin (6.70) safely negotiated their way to a highly anticipated final. Unfortunately Medwin suffered a hamstring injury after a strong start in the final, but Eugene ran consistently for bronze in 6.61 seconds, a season’s best which will hopefully lead to selection for Istanbul.
Defending champion Sam Khogali finished 3rd in the long jump with 7.45m, with the top 3 in the same order as in last year’s UK outdoor championships. Cindy Sember was the class of the field in the women’s 60m hurdles and duly took the win in a season’s best of 8.10. This was Cindy’s 5th British title overall and coupled with her British record at 100m hurdles at last year’s World Championships automatically qualifies her for Istanbul if she wants to compete. In the men’s 60m hurdles, having won his heat in 7.97, Cameron Fillery ran strongly for a seasons best of 7.93 and bronze.
Mary Elcock joined the club at the start of the year and having won the South of England indoor triple jump title went into the championship wearing the red bib as top ranked competitor this winter. Previous a specialist long jumper, Mary started focusing on triple jumping seriously with her coach Guy Spencer only last year. After a modest start Mary jumped an indoor PB of 12.71 in round 4 to equal the lead distance and then jumped 12.71 again in the final round to move from second into the gold medal position.
Sunday’s men’s high jump was the first competition for Will Grimsey since the Commonwealth Games last August. Despite this he was last to enter the event and three clearances later became UK champion for the first time. He narrowly failed in his third attempt at 2.20 after 2.16 wrapped up the title. Across the arena in the shot put Youcef Zatat was already set to add a seventh medal for WGEL, with his silver the 11th senior British shot put medal he has won. Youcef was second placed from round one and improved his distance steadily through the competition ending with 18.47.
Ellis Greatrex overcame the difficult lane 1 draw to qualify for the semi-final of the 400m in a seasons best of 48.67, but was unable to progress with a time 0.01 slower for fifth in the semi-final. Gwen Datey could not progress in the women’s 60m (7.78) and at 200m was unable to reach the standard of her bronze medal from the U20 championships the previous weekend as she was 4th in her heat in 24.92. Ben Potrykus was unable to respond as the pace stepped up in the final 800m of the 3000m final and ended ranked 7th in 8:09.46.