Friday the 13^th – renowned as the worst date in the calendar for the superstitious – began with a personal best for Johanna Jackson (Redcar RWC) on the second morning of the European Under 23 Championships in Debrecen, Hungary.

She rose at 4.30am, breakfasted while her Norwich Union Great Britain and Northern Ireland team mates slept peacefully and, as the steamy temperatures rose towards 30° Celsius following last night’s thunderstorms, finished a superb seventh in the women’s 20km walk (which started at 8am local time, 7am BST) in 1 hour 36 minutes 28 seconds, a PB by 49 seconds. Not bad on an unlucky day! “I didn’t even realise what date it is, I was up so early this morning,” she said as she recovered from her exertions in a race won by Tatyana Shemyakina (Russia) in a Championships record of 1:28:48. Jackson, coached by mother Maureen, negotiated the 2km laps of the Debrecen sports park and zoo in 9:52, 9:36, 9:27, 9:26, 9:28 (through 10km in 47:49), 9:30, 9:39, 9:43, 9:49 and 9:48. She said of her race: “I set off with some very good walkers and went through 10km in just under 48 minutes, which is my fastest. With 2km to go, I saw two cards [warnings] on the board so I had to slow down a bit [to avoid a third warning, which would have resulted in disqualification]. “My top target time was 1:36:40 but I was forgetting about times really: I just wanted to race.”

As the track action unfolded later in the morning…