Inter Counties Seniors Success

By Chris Jeggo

The South of England Intercounty Championships took place at The Julie Rose Stadium, Ashford, Kent on Sunday 14th July 2019. This senior team competition comprising of seven counties, with each county being permitted to field an A and B athlete across the range of track and field events, with points being allocated to the county, based on the athlete’s position. The accumulation of these points would decide the women’s, men’s and then combined county champions.

First up was Billy Praim-Singh throwing the Hammer. Having competed in multi events for the club in the Southern League at Bracknell the previous day, Billy then travelled to Kent for the day’s first event taking the B string win with a throw of 51.75m.

The first Harriers to compete on the track were Dominic King & Daniel King, taking time out of their training schedules to support their county in the 3000m walk. Dominic quickly established a lead, which he continued to build upon through the race, to win in a time of 12:02.92, with Daniel taking maximum points for the county in the event with a B win in 12:51.21.

With other endurance events taking place elsewhere on Sunday, Ed Mitchell and Angus Holford prioritised their county vests to compete in the 5,000m. Ed ran a personal best of 15:12.86 with an A sting 4th place. Angus kept pace with the main group for much of the race, taking 2nd in the B string in a time of 15:29.61, a seasons best

Sprinters’ times in the national ranking are also determined by whether the measured wind speed is within a legal limit. With the majority of this year’s events having wind speeds either outside of this or into a headwind, Rebecca Jeggo and Daniel Jones took advantage of the calm conditions. First year U20 athlete Daniel, earning his first Essex vest, ran under 11 seconds for the first time to take second place in the B string in a time of 10.93s. He then reduced his personal best in the 200m by 0.40s to again finish second in the B string in a time of 22.20s.

Fellow U20 athlete Rebecca was dominant in her A string 100m and 200m races. Showing her characteristic strength in the 100m, she pulled away from the field in the last 20m, achieving a personal best of 11.87s, which places her 12th in the country for U20. Later, in the 200m she ran her second fastest time of 24.36s with another convincing performance.

Both Daniel & Rebecca finished their day by competing for their respective 4 x 100m teams, with the Essex men taking the win in their match.

At the end of the day, Essex won the men’s competition, with their ladies finishing third. Overall Essex were victorious taking the combined championship.