27 January 2008

Keiren Kelly (Sale Harriers Manchester), one of the ‘star pupils’ of the shot put school run by Geoff Capes and Mark Proctor at Loughborough University, was the outstanding UK performer at the Woodies DIY Irish Indoor Championships at the Odyssey Arena, Belfast, this weekend.

The 21-year-old gentle giant won the shot title with a lifetime best of 18.20m, Championship Best Performance and Irish national record. While it is only 3cm better than his final performance of last year (18.17m at the first Saucony Loughborough Open on 15 December), it is an amazing 1.80m further than he was achieving at this time last year. It puts him 1.13cm clear at the top of the Power of 10 rankings for this winter.

Of last weekend’s English territorial indoor champions, Sarah Claxton (Woodford Green with Essex Ladies) won the Irish 60m hurdles title in 8.13 seconds, only three-hundredths outside the qualifying time for this winter’s World Indoor Championships in Valencia, Spain; Northern sprints double champion Anyika Onuora (Liverpool Harriers) scorched to 60m success in a season’s best of 7.38 seconds, within eight-hundredths of the Valencia qualifying time; and Southern 400m champion Tara Bird (also WG&EL) won the 800m in 2:10.6.

Richard Strachan (Leeds City AC), the Northern 200m champion, enjoyed his first outing of the year over his favourite distance: he won the men’s 400m in 47.53 seconds and needs 47.10 if he is to stand a chance of qualifying for the World Indoors. But the competition is hot: his fellow Yorkshireman Richard Buck (City of York AC) and South of England Champion Steve Green (Newham and Essex Beagles) both clocked 47.05 last weekend.

UK pole vault No.1 Kate Dennison (Sale Harriers Manchester) continued her fine start to the indoor season by finishing third at the 3^rd annual Springermeeting in Dresden, Germany, tonight.

After winning her previous two competitions at 4.35m and 4.23m, she cleared 4.30m to snatch third place on count back at one of Germany’s increasingly prestigious ‘jumping to music’ meetings, which attracted competitors from a dozen nations.

The former World Youth and World Junior Champion Lisa Ryzih (Germany) won with 4.40m – the qualifying height for this winter’s IAAF World Indoor Championships – while runner-up Silke Spiegelburg (also Germany) was one of five competitors to clear 4.30m.

For all of the details of the meeting click on Dresden