Meeting Report – Youth Development League

Lower Age Group – Match 3

Bournemouth, Saturday 22nd of June

Saturday the 22nd of June saw the third meeting of this season’s Youth Development League. A small band of travellers met at Kingsmeadow at 7:45 for our second long road trip to the Dorset Coast.

There was relief all round when the coach made it to the summit of some of the hills on the approach to Bournemouth. The track at King’s Park is in a wonderful parkland setting, adjacent to Bournemouth’s pretty and modern premiership football stadium.

With such a small team the stated aim for the day was on the athletes maximising their chances of setting personal bests in the events they train for. As it was the usual Kingston team spirit kicked in and every athlete took on the maximum number of events allowed. 

With everyone bar Frank being new to the stadium we had failed to spot that they had a second hammer and discus cage with its own pristinely manicured throws field. Thankfully one of the locals interrupted our hammer throwers enjoyment of the sunshine by the deserted hammer cage to point them in the right direction in time for their event. 

For those that had made the effort to attend the meeting the rewards were blue skies, a slight (but legal and recorded) tailwind for the sprinters and an organisation that were calling out and publishing results within minutes of events finishing. Quite often the full results were announced over the tannoy before our athletes even made it back from collecting their water bottles or trainers. This was a treat for the Surrey-based Walton and Kingston athletes who were wholly unaccustomed to this level of efficiency.

I am delighted to report that every single athlete set at least one personal best. Additionally Caitlyn Harvey ran a Level 3 U15G 800m in 2:26.3 and Roel Sodusta’s PBs in the 100m and 200m were both Level 4 performances. 

Thanks to Pat Logan, Frank Schubert, Susanne Dietrich and Ulrike Chang for helping the athletes and amassing points as officials. As ever the Field Officials team were supported by parents. 

The Squad

U15 Boys (7) - Albert Rowland, Eternal Nemiala, Finnian Chang, Jack Le Vesconte, Oliver Palmer, Roel Sodusta, Sam Atkins

U15 Girls (3) – Evie Priest, Caitlin Harvey, Nelly Priest

U13 Girls (4) – Bethan Norvill, Caitlyn Pemberton, Calla Lazou, Josephine Perrin

U13 Boys (0)

Personal Bests

Albert Rowland (High Jump – 1.35m, 

Eternal Nemiala (100m – 13.4s, 200m, Javelin)

Finnian Chang (Discus – 11.82m, Hammer)

Jack Le Vesconte (Long Jump – 4.55m, 80m Hurdles – 14.5s, 

Oliver Palmer (800m – 2:21.5, Shot)

Roel Sodusta (100m – 12.2s, 200m – 25.4s, Hammer)

Sam Atkins (800m – 2:23.9, Shot)

Caitlyn Harvey (100m – 13.7s)

Evie Priest (High Jump – 1.35m, Discus 15.10m)

Nelly Priest (100m – 13.7s, Shot 7.15m)

Bethan Norvill (150m – 21.9s, Javelin 10.94m)

Caitlin Pemberton (Javelin)

Calla Lazou (150m - 22.5s, 

Josephine Perrin (75m – 11.8s, 1200 – 4:29.2)

The Outcome

Despite the club kindly part-funding the coaches for both the long road trips we have struggled to get the younger athletes to the YDL meetings. With such a small squad it was of little surprise to find ourselves at the bottom of the table. 

The match position did little to dent the overall sense of satisfaction as the athletes boarded the coach for the pleasantly quick journey home.

On the plus side it looks like Winchester and Chichester will be moving up to our Division next season. This will mean that our furthest possible journeys would be to Aldershot or the Sussex coast. We might even end up with the 2020 meetings at Kingston, Walton, Camberley and Woking ☺

The final meeting will be at Eton’s Thames Valley Stadium on Saturday the 20th of July. 

Richard White

Sunday 19th April saw the K&P team competing at the Croydon Track, much more local this time compared to Yeovil! It was great to have so many compete for us and produce some great results.

Women’s Team

In the throws, we had Natalie Miller and Pippa Wingate doing a great job getting us some valuable points in the Hammer, Discus, Javelin and Shot. Both came 1st or 2nd in their strings and Natalie got a PB in the hammer, throwing the heavier 4K for the first time - well done Natalie!

Continuing in the field were Hannah Lester, Rhianna Reynolds and Lucy Tunnacliffe. Hannah jumped 9.80m in the triple jump, coming 1st in the B string and came 2nd in the B string Long Jump with 4.44m. Rhianna jumped 10.96m coming 2nd in the A string competition and came close to her PB in the high jump with 1.50m. Lucy won the A string Long Jump with a jump of 5.51m and threw a PB of 9.63m in the shot, winning the B string.

On the track, there were PBs all round. We had Katy Lord grabbing two PBs in the 100m and 200m with 13.07s and 26.12s respectively. Imogen Busa ran a PB of 65.84s in the 400m and Kira Holt took two PBs in the 100m and 200m with 13.08s and 26.21s respectively. Louisa Stoney also got a PB in the 200m with 25.36s and Lucy Atkins with a PB of 13.20s in 100m. In middle distance, Isabella Shepherd-Evans ran a PB of 05:21 in the 1500m. Jo Richardson, Izzy Hatton and Natalie Miller all ran new events to get points for the team. Jo Richardson, who is normally a sprinter, ran in the 800m and 1500m to gain points. Izzy Hatton and Natalie Miller had a giggle going round the steeplechase for the first time and got completely soaked. Finally in the relay: Izzy, Kira, Louisa and Katy smashed it in the 4x100m and came first by quite a long way with a time of 50.79s. Well done, ladies!

Men’s Team

On the men’s team, Gareth Cook came first in the A string for Hammer with 50.83m, and first in the B strings for Shot (11.48m) and Discus (35.47m). Chris Dack was first in the A string discus with 41.45m and Kyle Stevens won the A string Shot (13.73m) and B string Hammer (46.24m). In the Javelin, William Trimble won the A string with 48.93m and Sebastian Chang got a PB with 29.96m.

In the jumps, we had Chris Hall in the Triple Jump with 12.08m and winning the A string Long Jump with 6.33m. We also had Freddy Crosby coming close to his PB with 1.70m in the high jump.

In the sprints, Max Perez-Diaz ran in the 100m and 200m with 11.82s and 23.43s respectively. Chris Hall launched himself over 110m hurdles again and smashed it in first place with 16.62s. Marius Ball went home with 2 PBs in the 100m (11.82s) and 200m (24.12s). Another double PB was achieved by Ellis Down with 12.13s in the 100m and 24.54 in the 200m. Jonathan Darby dominated in the 400m coming first with 53.41s and then still had energy to run the 3000m for us in 09:52. For middle distance we also had Alex Thomas, Michael Webb-Bourne and Humphrey Allen grab us some valuable points. Alex Thomas ran 02:02 for the 800m and in the B string, Michael Webb-Bourne ran 02:17. Then in the 1500m, Humphrey Allen ran 04:33 for the A string and Michael Webb-Bourne running 05:09 for the B string. Finally, we had the 4 x 100m relay with Chris Hall, Ellis Down, Max Perez-Diaz and Marius Ball coming a close 3rd place with 46.50s.

This SAL match was a mixed 4x400m (which is always good fun!) so our team included Jonathan Darby kicking us off, Katy Lord and Louisa Stoney covering middle ground and Max Perez-Diaz running 4th and pushing us into second place with 03:52.

Overall, it was a great match and we were up against some tough competition from Milton Keynes and Croydon. We came 4th in the match with 174 points which was brilliant considering we were missing athletes in quite a few events. A huge thank you to everyone who came and supported and also a special mention to all our officials: Peter Shilling, Maurice Joyce, Dorinda Lester and Matt Atkins. They earned us 15 officials points for the club and did a fantastic job!

Brilliant Work Team K&P, see you at the next one!