Walton athletes had a successful weekend at the county championships continuing our recent trend of increasing participation and improved results.

A total of 26 athletes competed and picked up 19 medals including seven county titles.

Carla Letheby repeated her amazing feat from last year of winning four county titles. She won the under 17 women’s discus, javelin and hammer (in which she set a new club record) and also entered and won the under 20 women’s discus. Carla has now won 11 county outdoor titles in three years. She wasn’t the only winner in the age group as Kate Lee knocked a second off her pb to win the 300m hurdles. Lisa O’Brien set new bests in winning silver in the 80m hurdles and bronze in the long jump. Kate Lee was 4th in the 80m hurdles and Sinead O’Brien.set new pb’s in the shot and discus in both of which she finished 6th.

In the under 15 girls hammer Leanne Jupp and Emma Francis recorded pb’s and picked up silver and bronze medals. Camilla Papa came 2nd in her heat of the 100m (with Lucy Paskell 5th) and finished 5th in the final. Alice Wills ran a season’s best for 5th in the 1500m heats and was almost as quick in the final.

Two under 13 girls entered, Lucy Weir long jumped to a new pb and came 4th, omly missing a medal by a few centimetres and Issy Stewart had the busiest weekend of any of the Walton athletes. She entered six events, produced pb’s in five of them and won medals in three. PB’s in shot, discus and javelin won two silvers and a bronze and a 100m pb on Saturday was follwed on Sunday by an 800m pb in the heats and another one for 6th place in the final.

Rosie Marino led the way for the under 20 women with a silver medal in the 400m hurdles. Ellen Sellwood and Rebecca Pickering both came 6th in the finals of the 400m and the 100m respectively.

There were two titles for the senior women, Kaylee Price won the sprint hurdles and Susie McLoughlin won the 400m hurdles. Jo Regan was 4th in the long jump and 5th in the hammer.

Lewis Bateman came 4th in his heat of the under 15 boys 100m and qualified for the final. Hugo Fleming was 4th in the high jump, (missing a medal on countback) and won his heat of the 800m comfortably. In the final he led for all but the last few metres and won the silver medal.

Ben Kennard won the silver medal in the 400m hurdles for under 17’s and in the 3000m George Thomas ran his second fastest ever time.

Martin Norman ran a pb in his heat of the under 20 men’s 400m and in the 800m Alex Ferrelly ran a seasons best for 5th place in the final.

Adam McCarthy ran strongly to win sliver in the senior men’s 400m hiurdles and David O’Connell was 6th in his heat of the 400m.

Meanwhile in the Sussex Championship, Julian Langley won the silver medal in the senior men’s sprint hurdles.

The improvement in entrants and results over the last four years is impressive.