The Kettering Town Harriers youngsters have excelled during the 2019 track & Field season with record number of 9 athletes hitting the tough English Schools qualifying standard and 6 athletes being named in the Northamptonshire Schools 26 athlete line up (24 in the team with 2 reserves).
4 of the Harriers selected for ES line up, left to right
Alice Bates 1500m, Alice Bennett 800m, Logan Reid 100m, Katie Gibson Hammetr
Of the 6 Harriers named in the 26 squad, 5 have made the final 24 team and all boast National Standards:
Emily Williams Senior Girls 1500m, Emily a three times medalist and two time champion defends her title won in 2018 over 1500m as an Inter Girl. Emily is ranked 3rd in the UK U20 rankings and has a National standard time of 4:21.28. Coach Shane Smith
Logan Reid who will make his first appearance at the all England Championships over the 100m as an Inter-boy has had a phenomenal debut season under the guidance of coach Ann Inniss-Haycox and is ranked 5th in the UK, and has set a National standard time of 10.9.
Also making her debut at English Schools at her first attempt in Bottom year Junior-Girl Alice Bates who joined the Harriers at the beginning of the year and under the guidance of coach Shane Smith she has seem a tremendous improvement over her preferred distance of 800m, slicing almost 10 seconds of her PB with a National Standard time of 2:14.36.
Fynn Batkin makes his 2nd appearance at the Championships as a Senior Boy over 3,000m, having set a National Standard time of 8:29.80 in his only race of the season and he sits at 19th in the UK U20 rankings. Coach Shane Smith
Also making her 2nd appearance at the Championships in Junior-Girls Hammer thrower Katie Gibson, who has thrown a National standard distance of 45.59m and is ranked 5th in the UK. Coach Lorna Barlow/ Matt Bell
Alice Bates who also only been with the Harriers for one season is selected as a reserve, and may be offered a place if club colleague Emily Williams get selected to represent GB at the European U20 Championships? Alice set her qualifying time of 4:46.78 and has a UK ranking of 30th. Coach Shane Smith
The three athletes who can be considered very unfortunate not to be representing Northants at the English Schools Championships due to the county having very limited number of places (24).
Dylan Bowley who has the Inter-Boys 1500m Qualifying standard with 4:04.9 and is ranked 40th in the UK over this distance, but with x3 county athletes who were ranked higher Bowley had opted for the 800m where he was just shy of the quali time by just 0.24 of a seconds and ranked 29th in the UK in this event. Coach Shane Smith
Joe Bradley who has also made great strides this season in the Inter-Boys setting a qualifying mark of 22.5 in the 200m UK ranked joint 28th. Coach Ann Inniss-Haycox.
Cynthia Ike who ran as a top year Junior at English Schools in 2018 also set the qualifying mark of 12.4 for the 100m with a UK ranking joint 35th. Coach Ann Inniss-Haycox
This was a brilliant showing from the Harriers with athletes represented from three different squads, and it shows the strength in depth of the youngsters coming through the system, with many more younger athletes also lining up to follow in their footsteps.
Well Done to everyone selected and also those who make the qualifying standard.