YDL Nuneaton 21^st May 2022

Chief photographer and reporter for the day: Ben Godber.

It was a wonderful day at The Pingles Stadium, Nuneaton for Tamworth Athletics Club. A total of 11 athletes, their supporters and coaches attended a Youth Development League match on 21st May 2022.

It was a great day for the Under 13 girls despite only 3 athletes competing. Lottie O’Donoghue had an excellent day winning the 75m with a PB of 10.5s, another PB of 20.6s to win the 150m, and a 1st in the A string of the long jump jumping a fabulous 3.98m. Competing in all the same events as Lottie was Lola Gossage with a 3rd in the 75m sprinting a time of 11.4, a 2nd in her first ever 150m capturing a time of 22.2s, and jumping 3.28m in her first Long Jump to finish 3rd in the B string. Isla Rogers competed in the 800m where she won with a Personal Best of 2:36.8. In the shotput, Isla threw a PB of 5.15m finishing her in 3rd and in the javelin, she threw her PB of 13.45m to place her in 2nd.

Tamworth Athletics only had the one boy in the Under 13s but even then, he still did a stunning job for the team. George Haddock ran in the 75m clocking a 10.9 in 5th, he also finished 3rd in the 150m with a time of 21.7 and jumped a new PB in the long jump with a 3.5m. Missing from action today, unfortunately, was Carson Scott, who suffered a rib injury earlier this week.

The Under 15 girls had a great number of girls competing today with 5 athletes. Their really strong start happened with Jessica Salt and Sophie Godber in the Long Jump. Sophie jumped 3.5m to put her 2nd in the B string while Jessica recorded a 3.79m in her first ever Long Jump to place her 2nd in the A string. Sophie later ran 30.7 in her first ever 200m placing her 3rd followed by 52.5 in the 300m to put her 5th later on in the day. Jessica threw a mighty 5.26m in the shotput putting her 4th. Later on, Jessica equalled her PB of 5:01.7 in the 1500m to win her the race by a grand 21 seconds. Also, in the 1500m was Ella Moss who ran a PB of 5:41.8 to put her 1st in the B race, Ella also equalled a PB of 1.30 metre in the High Jump to pick up a win. Competing as the A runner in the 200m with Sophie was Chloe Purkis who ran 28.5 seconds to knock 1.5 seconds off her PB finishing 3rd. Hannah Beales ran an awesome 800m with a time of 2:29.8 to finish 2nd. She piled so much pressure on her rival from Royal Sutton Coldfield. At the end of the day, 4 of the girls pulled together an amazing 4 x 100m relay coming 3rd with a time of 57.3.

The Under 15 boys only had two athletes due to another injury but despite this, they still scored some valuable points. Oliver Shortman ran 2:46.2 in the 800m to place him 3rd grabbing a new PB and later finished 3rd with a time of 50.4s in his first ever 300m. Oliver also took part in the Shotput and threw an excellent 4.66m to record a 5th. Zac Edwards took to the track for 1500m finishing 4th with a PB of 5:34.7, later he jumped a brilliant 2.86m in his first ever Long Jump.

It was an amazing day for the 11 athletes who took part. Tamworth finished 5th in the match due to reduced numbers. There were 15 PBs and 7 AAA grade ranked performances. Many thanks to Colin Pleass for coaching and helping all the athletes, Andy Godber for his excellent team management and Kevin Westlake, Christine Westlake and Melanie Woolley for officiating and helping Tamworth out.