ALL young athletes aspire to compete at English Schools level, the biggest track and field competition anywhere in the world, in terms of numbers of athletes.

This year’s championships will be in Birmingham in July and the first step to qualifying for that are the various County Championships. These took place last Saturday.

The Avon match at Yate saw several athletes from Yate and District Athletics Club in action.

There was a double win in the senior boys’ high jump with Jack Moore clearing 1.86m and David Thomas only three centimetres behind him.

In the Inter Boys category, Isaac Cory had a splendid day with good wins in both 100m and 200m.

Max Elliott was a fraction of second behind him in the 100m, suggesting that he has more speed somewhere in the tank.

Nathaniel Mitchel has recently discovered the 400m event. He won here in an encouraging time of 51.61 secs.

Before this event, Liam Hillier’s best performance in the pole vault was 3.03m.

Here he soared to a new personal best of 3.24m, a height that he could scarcely believe. Toby Conibear continued his progress in the hammer with a throw of 52.49m.

The only Yate winner in the Senior Girls age group was Hannah Hobbs in the 3,000m. Her time of ten minutes 05.60 seconds left her well clear of the opposition.

Hannah Lewis won the Inter Girls’ pole vault and Georgia Crew the triple jump.

The Junior Girls 1500m saw Dalis Jones run away with it, well clear of her nearest rival.

Nineteen Yate athletes have been selected for the Avon team to compete in the next stage – the South West Schools in Exeter and we wish them all luck in the biggest contest that many of them will have seen.

Not all Yate athletes go to school in Avon, so attention switched to Gloucestershire Schools and Wiltshire Schools.

There were two Yate winners at Gloucestershire.

Ben Latham took the Inter Boys’ pole vault title with a leap of 3.15m, while Jodie Dale, fresh from her performance at the Midland League won the javelin with a throw of 34.05m.

Meanwhile, in Wiltshire, Owen Merritt and James Viner renewed their rivalry in the hammer.

This time Owen came out on top with a throw of 46m while James had to be content with third with a throw of 40m.

And there are big changes in prospect at the Yate and District track at the Yate Outdoor Sports Complex.

On July 9, the day after the Run for Life charity event, the track closes for a complete redevelopment and will not reopen until early October.

Members of Yate and District AC should be aware that training will continue as usual on the rest of the YOSC complex. They should ask their coach what arrangements are in place.