Thu Apr 11 2024

On a blustery day in Epsom, our athletes performed amazingly well to finish in first place in Division 2!

It was great to see so many new faces competing for the club. We had seven U11 boys taking part, which is a record number since I became team manager over 3 years ago. It was also the first proper athletics competition for two U13s and two U15s. I know there were some initial nerves, but I hope that everyone enjoyed their first experience of competing for Kingston & Poly.

A total of 27 K&P athletes took part on Sunday, which I believe is a new record. So, unfortunately, I'm not able to mention everyone here, but I'll highlight some particularly impressive performances from the day.

U11
For the U11s, Max and Edward both clocked equally fast times of 12.8 seconds in the 75m. Imran wasn't far behind with his time of 13.3.

Ziggy was very quick in the 150m, finishing in 24.9 seconds - the third fastest time of all the U11s.

U13
Twins Ivan and Alex both ran excellent 1500m races, each scoring top points in the A and B strings, with times of 5.03.2 and 5.09 respectively.

Pascal won the long jump competition with a great new PB of 4.03m.

Joseph, our only thrower of the competition, finished first in the javelin, by some margin, with a big throw of 27.32m.

U15
In the U15 100m, Grindan finished first in the A string race in a quick time of 12.7 seconds, and Lukas won the B string race in 13.5. Lukas also ran very well in the 300m, scoring top points in a very good time of 42.1 seconds.

Grindan was also very quick in the 200m, winning the A race in 25.5 seconds, whilst Sam won the B race in 28.7.

Avery achieved a great new PB in the high jump, clearing a height of 1.45m, beating his previous best by 13cm!

U17
Charlie ran well for the U17s, finishing the 400m in a time of 60.7 seconds.

I also have to mention my son Sam's high jump performance, where he smashed his previous PB by clearing 1.86m.

Relays
Every Ebbisham League competition ends with the 4 x 100m relays, and the U13 squad of Leo, Pascal, Jeevan, and Edward (shown in the accompanying photo) did brilliantly. It was U11 Edward's first time competing for K&P, and he'd never even practised a relay until half an hour before the race, so to see him bringing the baton home in second place was amazing.

The U15 squad of Dwayne, Sam, Avery, and Grindan also put on a great performance, scoring first place points in a time of 54.2 seconds. They all ran very well under the pressure of having to race against some rather large U17 athletes.

Overall, I'm very pleased with how everyone performed, and finishing in first place in our first competition of the season is the best start we could've asked for. It would be good to fill some of the empty spots in the next two competitions though, particularly in the throwing events. This will give us the best chance to finish the season at the top of Division 2 and earn promotion to Division 1 next year.