Track & Field Round-Up
WGwEL athletes were involved in a number of high class meetings around Europe over the weekend and last week. Dan Awde made a significant breakthrough in the decathlon, scoring an Olympic "B" standard of 8102 points, while Gemma Weetman achieved a heptathlon personal best at the same meeting. There were good sprint hurdles results for Tiffany Porter, Richard Alleyne and from Sarah Claxton who improved again on Monday evening
Dan Awde's significant improvement came at the Arona combined events meeting in Spain. He improved his personal best from 7889 points to 8102 points, comfortably exceeding the Olympic Games"B" standard of 7950, and approaching the "A" standard of 8200 points. The 23 year old Beijing Olympian whose progression since those Olympic Games has been held back by a knee injury that required surgery, now seems to have put those troubles behind him. His solid set of marks included personal bests in the long jump with 7.47m (-0.1) and shot with 13.67m. In most other events Dan approached his best ever performances. His other marks were: 100m 10.87 secs (-1.1), HJ 1.91m, 400m 47.14 secs, 110mH 14.44 secs (+0.5), DT 42.88m, PV 4.70m, JT 54.55m, and 1500 4m23.66 secs. Dan's score surpasses David Bigham's Club record, and moves him to 4th on the UK all-time lists.
At the same meeting Gemma Weetman also improved her personal best in the heptathlon as she scored 5427 points. Gemma's marks were 100mH 14.69 secs (0.0), HJ 1.62m, SP 12.34m p.b., 200m 25.91 secs, LJ 5.87m (-1.8), JT 36.22m, 800m 2m15.14 secs.
On Friday night at the Golden Spike meeting in Ostrava, Tiffany Porter, confirmed her current form as one of the best in the world as she won over 100mH in a fast 12.65 secs (+1.6). Beijing finalist in the same event, Sarah Claxton continued to improve as she won at Bonneuil France with a season's best of 13.25 secs (+2.0), but on Mondday evening at a meeting at Rehlingen, Germany, went even better fist placing 2nd with 13.23 secs (+1.3), then again improving her season's best as she won with 13.16 secs (+0.6). Also showing good hurdling form was Richard Alleyne, who on Thursday evening in Oslo improved his best ever to 13.70 secs (0.0) as he won over 110mH. Shana Cox also raced at Ostrava and placed 8th in the 400m with 52.26 secs, whilst at Hengelo, Netherlands on Sunday, Joice Maduaka placed 6th over 200m with 23.44 secs (-0.9), and in Oordegem, Belgium, Jon Cook recorded a season's best of 1m49.01 secs to finish 2nd over 800m.