‘The best showing for many years’ was the verdict of the Avon team management after a highly successful two days at the English Schools’ Championships in Manchester.
One gold, five silvers and one bronze comprised the tangible hardware return from the squad that enjoyed scorching conditions at the Sportcity Stadium.
On top of that four Avon athletes were selected to represent England at the SIAB British Schools Championships in Belfast next weekend by virtue of finishing in the top two of their intermediate age group events.
Team Bath’s Dylan Stoneman was runner-up in the inters 1500m steeplechase, smashing his PB in the process while the Bristol & West AC pair of Nyree Perry and MacKenzie Ritson were silver medallists in the pole vault and 200m respectively.
The third athlete to qualify was North Somerset AC’s George Leite, who threw a huge PB by half a metre to finish runner-up in the shot, but unfortunately a family holiday will deny him the chance to compete.
“It was a great weekend,” said Jim Strudwick, who has been on the Avon Schools’ management team for more years than I can remember.
“I calculated that including the eight medallists we had 18 personal bests and 19 in the top 8 in their events.
“Charlie Haines (junior boys 800m bronze) time was six seconds faster than he ran at the South West and Estelle Lowe (junior girls 1500m heats) knocked five seconds off her PB.
“This is the best showing from an Avon team for many years.”
The star performance came from Yate’s Luke Ball. He went into the senior boys’ high jump as a firm favourite and he didn’t disappoint as he cleared a personal best of 2.12m to finish a staggering 17cms clear of the runner-up.
It was Ball’s third English Schools’ title to complete a clean sweep of the age groups having won his first gold as a junior boy in 2019 and followed that with the inter boys’ gold last year when he also went on to win the British Schools’ title. He also has a bronze on his debut in 2018.
What an amazing record and hopefully will be the springboard for Ball to go on and enjoy a successful career as a senior athlete.
As well as the three silvers mentioned above there were also two silvers for the Bristol & West AC sprint pair of Ed Wilson and MacKenzie Ritson.
“The two sprint races were amazing to watch as they both got there in the last 10 metres,” added Strudwick.
Indeed, Wilson was given the same time as the winner of 21.90secs in the senior boys’ 200m but was handed silver by the slimmest of margins – 0.001secs!
Yes, a thousand of a second was the difference between gold and silver for the Bristol & West sprinter coached by Tristan Jamieson.
Ritson is also coached by Jamieson and he blazed to a PB of 21.50secs to win his heat – racing into a big headwind -before clocking 21.68sec sin the final.
Not since the days of Ryan Scott, Jason Gardener and Lloyd Rice has Avon enjoyed such medal success in the sprint events so well done to Jamieson and his athletes.
GOLDS: Luke Ball senior boys high jump
SILVERS: Ed Wilson SB 200; MacKenzie Ritson IB 200m; Dylan Stoneman IB 1500m steeplechase; George Leite IB shot; Nyree Perry IG pole vault.
BRONZES: Charlies Haines JB 8000; Ash Hillier-Smith JG hammer.