The May bank holiday weekend brought much excitement for student athletics in the form of the BUCS outdoor athletics championships.
There were spectacular performances from students around the UK, including new records in the Pole Vault (well done to Adam Hague with 5.35m), Hammer (well done to Taylor Campbell of Loughborough with 73.40m), as well as both the seated discus and shot put for Vanessa Wallace (F34) and Stacie Gaston (F57) in their respective categories. Being LUCA though, we want to give a great big shout-out to the students of LUCA member clubs who did a fantastic job!
Particularly notable performances include:
Track
Corinne Hymphrey’s (East London University), Stephanie Clitheroe (St Mary’s), Danielle Blake (Brunel) and Lukesha Morris (Brunel) all qualifying for the Women’s 100m final. Corinne Humphrey went on to win in 12.08s, followed in second place by Lukesha Morris in 12.33s.
Meanwhile, in the Men’s 100m final, Reuben Arthur of Goldsmiths won in 10.75s, with Luke Dorrell, of Brunel, coming in 5th with 10.95s and Shad-Marc Aaron of East London coming in 8th with 11.21s.
The Women’s 100m Hurdles final featured 3 LUCA athletes; Sydney Griffin of East London, third in 13.81s, Stephanie Clitheroe of St Mary’s, 4th in 14.00, and Mobolaji Adeokun of East London, 5th in 14.00s – clearly a very close race!
The 200m finals were closely fought, but won by reigning champion, Kyle Ennis of East London in 21.46 and by Maya Bruney, also of East London, in 23.95, for the Men’s and Women’s races, respectively.
In the Women’s 400m, Lauren Russell of East London qualified for the finals and ended up 6th with 55.04, with Chloe Thornton of UCL putting in a strong performance in the semi-finals.
Lilly Coward, who performed well in the 1500m at BUCS indoors, made it to the Women’s 800m finals along with Bettina Rottweiler of UCL. In a tough final, Lilly finished 4th in 2:10.74, and Bettina in 7th with 2:15.78.
St Mary’s also put in strong performances in the Men’s 800m, with Nzimah Akpan making it to the final in a sea of strong Loughborough performances and finishing 4th overall with a time of 1:50.50.
This continued in the Men’s 1500m final, with St Mary’s placing 3rd (Tom Hook, 3:49.32) and 5th (Jacob Allen, 3:50.66).
In the Men’s 5km, St Mary’s showed their traditional endurance domination, in the A final with 1st (Ellis Cross), 3rd (Emile Cairess), 5th (Jack Rowe) and 10th (Bradley Goater). UCL athlete, Gus Cockle, also put in a strong performance against the blue and white stripes of St Mary’s, finishing in 7th.
In the Women’s 5km, Katie Astin of St Mary’s competed in the B race, finishing in 19:04.68 with her team-mate, Rebecca Howard competing in the race and coming 11th overall in 17:16.02. Meanwhile, Philippa Bowden of Brunel finished 4th overall in 16:18.01 and Hannah Viner, of King’s, came 9th overall with 16:58.02.
In the steeplechase, Dan Jarvis (of St Mary’s) came in third in 9:01.35 in the Men’s race, whilst in the women’s a St Mary’s athlete, Emily Moyes, won in 6:35.07 (knocking over a second off the previous record!).
In the Men’s 100m Wheelchair race, Will Smith (T54) of St Mary’s performed well to come second in 17.51s. He also competed in the 800m, and completed the race in 1:48.54. The Ambulatory Men’s 200m final saw Amar-Mazigh Aichoun (T38), of Brunel, finishing in 25.05.
East London won both the Men’s and Women’s 4x100m relay finals, highlighting their strength in the sprinting events.
Field
*Updated on the 4th May* Apologies for missing out on the excellent performance of Essex student, Harry Hughes, who threw 76.81m in the men’s javelin – 0.11m short of the Championship record – to win gold.
Robert Sutherland of King’s College London was 4th in the Triple Jump final with 14.52m, and his teammate Temitope Fisayo achieved an admirable 12.63m. Julien Allwood, of University of London, was 8th with 13.75m.
The Women’s High Jump final saw 3 Brunel athletes competing, Laura Zialor (8th with 1.63m), Emma Nwofor (equal 9th with 1.60m) and Georgia Nwawulor (equal 9th with 1.60m). The Men’s final had only one Brunel athlete, Jake Storey, who managed to jump 2.06m to come third, followed in 4th by a Goldsmiths student, Tayo Andrews-Haycocks, also jumping 2.06m.
In the Women’s Pole vault final, Clare Maurer of Imperial jumped to victory with 3.80m.
In the Women’s Javelin throw, Leanne Davies of Brunel came 5th in the final with 39.51m.
In the Men’s Shot Put final, Youcef Zatat, of East London, won with a throw on 17.23m, with two Brunel athletes in 3 and 4th (Kai Jones and Sam Heawood, respectively). Another Brunel athlete, Chloe Vernon-Hamilton performed well in the Women’s final to come 8th with a throw of 11.85m.
In the ambulant field events, as well as the record breaking Vanessa Wallace in the shot and discuss, Lorn Mayers performed well in the Shot Put with 12.38m.
Meanwhile in the ambulatory Long Jump, Ryan Raghoo (T36) jumped in windy conditions to obtain 4.59m and come third.
