Medal Storm at Aberdeen Nationals  

After a long wait and a long car journey up to Aberdeen’s Sports Village, many athletes came away with a sense of relief and medals and PB’s. The Granite City hosted the Scottish National Championships over two days with the Saturday hosting U13/U17 and the Sunday hosting U15/U20. The Championship worked on a ‘Top 16’ system with the fastest 16 times on the track qualifying for the A/B final- this sped things up slightly.

On Saturday, young Erin Connelly competed in the U13 age category in the 100m competed in heat 4 to bag a place in the top 16 with 14.16s with a shocking 3.8m/s tailwind. She finished in 8^th place with 14.41s and no recorded wind speed. She also chose to run in the sprint double but could not manage to make the 200m final with 31.41s. A good performance, none the less. Erin was placed in Pool 2 of long jump as well. She jumped well with 3.61m.

Kudzai Tapatapa, younger brother of 400m Scottish Schools Champion Kuda, ran in the 100m and put in a gutsy performance in the heats to qualify for the final with a time of 13.80s. In the B final, he finished in a strong 5^th place with 13.93s. He ran an impressive 200m as well with a time of 29.76s which was fast enough for the final. In the final, Kudzai finished in 6^th place with a faster time of 29.48s, but with an illegal 3.0m/s wind speed. A good run to make both finals!

Finlay Walker, a young protégé of Harald, competed in the javelin. He walked away with a bronze medal with a throw of 23.17m. Not only that, he thrived off the support of his family in the pole vault competition: He managed to clear a PB height of 2.10m and Finlay won his first national gold medal- well done. Harald’s video of his PB clearance can be seen on the Harriers facebook.

 The Pole Vault Protege

The U15 girls proved to be something extraordinary with Lauren Greig and Evie Bartl:

Evie Bartl continued her medal streak where she PB’d in the javelin with 33.74m and stood on 1st place on the podium.  She moved onto clear 2.30m in pole vault and this was enough for a silver medal and to top off the medal streak with a 1,2,3 she came 3rd in shot putt with 9.95m.

Lauren, who recently started with Glasgow School of Sport, but still working alongside the Harriers sprints group ran in the 100m and 200m. After winning the double gold within 4 months of starting athletics last year, Lauren was up against her usual competition with everyone looking to snatch the title from her. Lauren won the 100m heats with an easy 10m gap in 12.60s and a PB. When it came to the final, she flew out the blocks, by far the fastest person out of them. She was leading the blanket of athletes up to 70m to which her main competitor, Sarah Malone, came creeping up and they both dipped on the line. The photo finish had 5+ prints of the finish to determine who was first. Having only one camera angle and Sarah being closer to the camera, she was given the gold by 0.01 of a second, but it must’ve been less than that! 12.46 was her time which is another PB but the wind made it illegal. Lauren was determined to get the gold for the 200m. In her heat, she did what she does best and took it by storm. The Scottish Champion crossed the line easily with 26.53 as the wind turned to a head wind instead of a tail. At this point, Sarah Malone from Edinburgh threw in the towel as she was noticeably injured. This allowed Lauren to storm through to retain her 200m title with a time of 26.34s.  Lauren beaten by Sarah Malone (left)
 

In the U17, Kuda Tapatapa was a very strong candidate in the 400m to add his to his recent Scottish Schools gold medal and Scotland selection for the Celtic Games. He stormed away to win his heat with almost a full second between him and 2^nd place. His time was 52.90s. This allowed him to qualify for the A final and what a race this was. Kuda went out hard for the first 100m and relaxed down the back straight upon where his fierce competition soon approached, he kept calm and composed coming round the top bend where he applied an extra gear into the home straight. Watching the race come to a close, Kuda had to settle with a bronze medal until the athlete in front of him face-planted from lactic acid overload in his legs. Whilst trying to crawl to the line, Kuda dipped to sneak the silver and finished with 50.69 which is a fantastic personal best.  Kuda sneaks a sliver medal

Cameron Wilson competed in the 200m and 400m for U17. His 200m ended up in 5^th place with 24.89 and unable to qualify for the final. His 400m finished with 55.21s with injury restricting his ability.

In his final year at U20, Scott Young competed in the 100m to try find a place on the podium. His heat was unbelievable which included a blistering start which was exactly on the B of the bang! From there on, he kept a strong position and finished 2^nd– allowing him to qualify for the final. In this final, everyone was hoping Scott to be in the mix for a medal. His start was extremely quick and he had everyone by 60m everyone came up onto his shoulder. Scott held on and held on and just got pushed down into bronze medal position with a time of 11.17s. Only 0.06 separated him from that gold medal.

Commiserations to Laura Duncan, who was expected to run on Sunday in the U20 women’s 100m but after a minor quadricep tear, she took the smart decision to not run, but with 4 national medals under her belt in this one year alone, she shouldn’t be too worried.

The club walked away with 8 medals across 4 athletes so it was clearly worth coming to compete. Also, Commonwealth 1500m Bronze Medallist Chris O’ Hare was also hiding in a few corners if you spotted him. (I know I did!)

Well done to all the athletes and good luck to all the athletes competing in the Club Championships soon.

Article by Reed Wyper.