The county championships took place over the weekend at Kingsmeadow. Walton were better represented tnan in recent years and the athletes were rewarded with plenty of good performances and a number of county titles and medals.

Leading the way were two of the younger athletes, Carla Letheby and Sam Linsley.

Carla broke tihe 10 meter barrier in the under 15 girls shot for the first time to win the first of the weekends titles, she followed that up with a javelin win, retaining the title she won last year. On Sunday Carla entered the under 17 girls hammer as there wasn’t a hammer event in her age group and beat the older girls to win another gold. She rounded the day off in the discus, throwing a new pb which beat the 16 year old county champs best performance to win her fourth title of the weekend. It was a hugely impressive performence, we don’t think anyone at the club has ever won four county titles in the same championship before.

Sam ran a pb to win his heat of the under 13 boys 800m and then in the final led for the first 600m. He was overtaken but hung on to the new leader and sprinted past him in the home straight to record another new pb and win the title.

On Sunday Sam entered the 1500m. As on Saturday he took the lead from the gun. By the end of the first lap he’d opened a gap and gradually increased the gap until he won by  about 8 seconds in another personal best time.
Two other under 13 boys competed. Sam O’Dell had a great competition setting pb’s in all of the events he entered and coming 5th in the 200m and long jump and 6th in the 80m hurdles. Phillip Bearman came 6th in his heat of the 800m.
No under 13 girls entered unfortunately and only one under 15 boy, Hugo Fleming who ran a pb for 3000m coming 5th in a large field.
Besides Carla, three other under15 girls competed. Abbie Wroth came 6th in the long jump and just missed qualifying for the 200m final, Kate Lee was 6th in the 75m hurdles and Alice Wills 14th in the 1500m. Kate was unfortunate in that her best event, the high jump, was cancelled due to a problem with the bed.
In the under 17 age groups George Thomas ran a pb in the 800m heats and Ellie Sellwood came 5th in the 100m final then ran a pb to come 4th in the 300m final.

Two under 20 women competed and came away with three medals. Rosie Marino won the bronze in the sprint hurdles shaving two hundredths of a second from her pb and then came 2nd in the 400m hurdles. Rebecca Pickering came 4th in the 200m then ran a new best time to win the silver in the 100m.
Five under 20 men were in action and although they didn’t win any medals, all five of them came away with new pb’s.
Ramon Wright was 5th in the 100m final and 6th in the 200m, setting new best times in the heat and then the final of the 200m.
Mark Partridge and James Hogan ran new best times in the heats of the 400m, and Mark went on to finish 7th in the final, Mark was also 5th in his heat of the 200m, narrowly missing qualification for the final..
Alex Ferrelly and Jack Marchbank set new bests in the 800m final with Alex coming 5th and Jack 7th. Alex had previously finished 7th in the 1500m.
In the senior women’s age group Nathalie Warren beat her pb for 800m winning a bronze medal in the process and then broke 5 minutes for 1500m for the first time, finishing 5th. Jo Regan fnished 5th in both the long jump and the triple Jump finals.
Adam McCarthy won the bronze medal in teh 400m hurdles in a new pb and Alex Fraser pb’d in his heat of the 400m and then came 5th in the final. Adam was 5th in his 400m heat and David O’Connell was 7th in his heat, David had previously set a new pb coming 6th in his 200m heat.
Walton’s final medal of the day was in the 1500m where Jon Hamblen showed he is still faster than the athletes he coaches with a 2nd place in his fastest time for a few years.

All in all 22 athletes from Walton competed compared with 15 last year and they won 12 medals, 6 gold, 3 silver and 3 bronze ,compared with 10 medals 3G-4S-3B in 2007. 
Full results are available on the Surrey AA website, follow the link below.

Full Results