Coach Bearman proud of Stratford AC's super six

STRATFORD athletes formed the backbone of the Warwickshire team that took part in the English Schools National Track and Field Championships at Gateshead.

The event is the fourth biggest athletics competition in the world, with more than 1,700 athletes from 45 counties in England competing each year over two days.

Warwickshire were only able to take 25 athletes, with six of them coming from Stratford AC — Issy Cain Daley, Emily Madden Forman, Jack Sumners, Jodie Watson, Imogen Sheppard and Oliver Cresswell.

Two others, Rory Dwyer and Zephan Boxall also qualified, but Dwyer is going to the World Junior Championships, while Boxall is currently injured.

“To step up to this level is very hard,” said Stratford AC coach, Paul Bearman.

“But once again Stratford athletes formed the backbone of the Warwickshire team.

“They can all be proud of themselves and they come away with varying degrees of satisfaction from their performances.

“All of them will have gained invaluable experience for the future.”

Day one saw Watson compete in the junior girls’ high jump and if being a first-timer in a competition at this level and only just coming back from a severe ten-week hamstring injury wasn’t daunting enough, she had to endure a heavy downpour in the middle of the competition.

Despite this, Watson jumped comfortably through the early rounds and finally went out of the competition at 1.54m.

In the same downpour, Ollie Cresswell ran in the inter boys’ 100m hurdles and finished comfortably in third place in 13.39 in his heat to qualify for the final.

Jack Sumners had the unsettling effect of two false starts by other athletes in his heat, but maintained his composure to finish second in the heat in a superb new personal best of 13.06.

The two training partners felt confident going into the final as they lined up alongside each other. Cresswell felt he had got away to a flyer at the start, but the starter called it as a false start which seemed to unsettle the other athletes.

At the second time of asking, they were off but Sumners didn’t get away well and was off the pace, but Cresswell stayed in contention with the leaders, finishing just outside the medals in fifth.

Next up came Emily Madden Forman in the inter girls’ triple jump.

Despite being extremely nervous, the plan was for her to get an early big jump in the first round, but she had to wait for the ‘big one’ with her third-round jump of 11.16m, which got her into the final and gave Madden Forman a further three jumps.

She wasn’t able to improve on her third -round jump, but she had produced her second biggest jump of the season to finish a respectable fifth out of a field of 22.

Issy Cain Daley was jumping in the senior girls’ high jump and struggled to get any rhythm in her run up in the windy conditions and was disappointed to go out of the competition at 1.63m. Imogen Sheppard was another first-timer and competed in the junior girls’ 800m.

The first lap of her heat was evenly paced and Sheppard was just off the leading pack, who surged ahead on the final lap leaving Sheppard to battle through to the finish.