Louth Athletic Club juniors shine at county championships

The eight will compete for Lincolnshire at the Anglian Schools Championships, while three of the group, Hannah Reid, Matthew Spendlove and Jevon George-Jones were further rewarded with automatic selection for the English Schools Championships.

Louth AC had 14 athletes representing the Coast and Wolds district at the County Championships, held in the grounds of Burghley House, after qualifying with fine performances at the district event held at Hubbards Hills.

In the junior girls event (Years 8 and 9) Evie Brooks continued her fine form by finishing an excellent seventh, closely followed by Freya Plaskitt in 12th, as both girls earned their place in the county squad.

Next up was the intermediate girls’ race (Years 10 and 11), held over a 4km course.

Reid consolidated her district win by finishing an outstanding fifth with a performance which showed she is finally putting last year’s injury issues behind her.

Another outstanding performance in this race came from Issy Dhami in 12th place who will also run at the Anglian Championships.

Club newcomers Megan Forman (36th) and Tilly Mossop (38th) had strong runs and will benefit enormously from the experience.

In the boys’ races, Declan Templeton finished a creditable 14th in a large field in the Year 7 race, while Spendlove continued to grow in stature with an outstanding race to finish sixth in the junior boys (Years 8 and 9) category.

Taran Dhami finished 25th after being badly baulked in a rather chaotic start to the race.

The intermediate boys (Years 10 and 11) brought several very good performances from club athletes.

George-Jones managed to put recent injury problems behind him to finish a brilliant sixth, and he was closely followed by Jayden Daniels in ninth and Lloyd Buck in 10th.

All three qualified to represent Lincolnshire at the Anglian Championships.

Unfortunately one of the club’s strongest athletes, Caleb Stephenson, suffered a recurrence of a muscle injury midway through the race which forced him to ease back on his pace and finish 20th.

The club wishes him a speedy recovery.

* Adam Dalton had a fantastic race at the Brass Monkey Half-Marathon, in York, last week, finishing 29th out of 1,486 competitors in 1hr 14min 33secs.

The time also beat his previous half-marathon best by a massive four minutes and 22 seconds, and placed him 35th in all male age groups, and 20th senior male, in the UK Half Marathon rankings for 2018.

* The individual results for Louth AC’s senior and veteran men at the Lincolnshire Cross Country Championships were –

Veterans: 7 Denzil Lynch 42min 05secs, 12 Jason Oxby 45.19, 13 Kevin Wallis 45.24, 19 Paul Snowden 47.08, 36 Phil Jackson 54.48. Senior Men: 13 Jack Darnell 46.12.

Additonal results – Under 15 Girls: 16 Megan Forman 19min 02secs, 17 Matilda Mossop 19.58.