NI Multi-Events Day 1 – 28 Aug
Mon 30 August 2010--admin
Day 1 – Saturday 28 August
Very heavy and frequent showers meant far from ideal conditions on day one of the N. Ireland age-group and Senior multi-event championships held at Bangor Sportsplex. However, this did not dampen the enthusiasm of either the City of Lisburn athletes competing or indeed the vociferous band of Lisburn support who were present through to the final race of the day.
In the boys U13 pentathlon, Ben Fisher rounded off an excellent season with a fine 2nd place. A great run over the 75m hurdles gave him good points and 3rd place after the first event. He lost a little ground after a 5.59m shot, but a solid high jump kept him right in the mix for the medals. He then excelled in the long jump, where in atrocious conditions off a rain-soaked run-up he extended his PB in each of the three rounds to finish with a great 4.62m! Finally he hauled his weary body round the track in 2m 55s to secure Lisburn’s first medal of the weekend – a well-deserved silver.
Sam Wallace competed well against athletes mostly a year older in the U15 pentathlon, eventually finishing in 5th place, with a good run over the 80m hurdles in 15.68s, the second fastest of the day, probably the highlight.
Adam Hill tackled the U17 boys’ Octathlon which runs over both days. He opened with his fastest ever electrically-timed 100m hurdles in 15.34s, helped by a 3.9 m/s wind. This was followed by a great 7.79m PB opening throw in the shot. He can always rely on his high jump for good points and 1.69m in the middle of torrential rain was outstanding. He wrapped up day 1 with a 66sec 400m PB to make that 3 PBs out 4 events and 3rd place overnight.
Libby Rose was a strong favourite to take the U17 heptathlon title and laid down a marker with a brisk 12.31s 80m hurdles which gave her a big lead straight away. She hasn’t done much high jumping this year, but her 1.36m was enough to retain her lead. In the shot she simply blew the opposition away with a huge 9.24m PB final round effort, the best throw of the day by any female athlete, junior or senior. She had one more top-drawer performance left, as her closing 26.81s 200m for day one was also the fastest of the day and a PB. This gave her a comfortable lead of almost 600 points overnight.
In the Junior (U20) heptathlon, Lisburn fielded two athletes, Karyn Dumigan and Sarah McIlmoyle who was making a welcome comeback after a few quiet seasons. Karyn had a very good first day, including a PB equalling 1.52m in the high jump and a 6.11m shot PB to lie in 1st place overnight. Sarah enjoyed her first day with good showings across all events to lie second overnight.
After a busy first day the athletes and coaches went home to brace themselves for an even busier day two where the hope was that many more medals would be won to go along with Ben’s!