A QUARTET of young Harriers took part in the English Schools' national championships in Birmingham and performed well.

Ben To, Taiwo Taiwo and Hannah Kelly were all selected to compete for Greater Manchester Schools, while Georgia Lever was to pull on the vest of neighbours Lancashire since moving to a college across the border last year.

Ben raced in the 100m in the junior boys' category in his first ever English Schools’ competition and ran powerfully, despite a slight stumble at 40m, finishing fifth in a time of 11.64secs.

It was an agonising 0.01 seconds outside the qualifiers for the semi-final.

He later ran the first leg of the 4x100m relay which saw the Greater Manchester team qualify for Saturday's final but luck was not on their side with the last-leg runner suffering cramp and unable to finish with the team set for a medal place.

Taiwo has suffered from sore knees this season but still lined up in her semi-final with high hopes.

She ran a fantastic bend but slowed in the last 50m. Despite running 25.51 – only 0.14 outside her PB – and finishing fourth, she missed out of the final.

Sixteen-year-old Hannah Kelly, fresh from her new PB at the England Athletics U20 championships, also lined up in the inter-girls 200m.

In her heat, she cruised to the line in the fastest semi-final time of 24.47.

In the final, she lined up in lane six with her main competitors inside her. She came off the bend running strongly but Kiah Dubarry-Gray finished a little stronger to finish first and push her into second place.

It was a place higher than last year for Hannah, who has now been selected to run for England at next weekend’s SIAB school international in Dublin.

Senior girl Georgia Lever has been a revelation this year.

Still a novice in the triple jump, she won silver at this year’s Northern Championships which saw her selected in the Lancashire team.

After a no jump in the first round, she got a safe jump in the second round.

In the third round she leapt 11.38 to record a PB before going on to jump 11.68, earning her fourth place on the day.

She said: "To jump four PBs in one competition and to record a national standard in only my sixth ever triple jump competition is amazing."

Georgia has also been selected to compete for the North of England against the best jumpers from the South, the Midlands, Wales and Welsh Schools in Cardiff.

Taiwo and Hannah made up half of the Greater Manchester 4x100m relay team.

In the semi-final, they were pipped into second by a very strong Surrey team, but they were later disqualified for a faulty changeover.

Confidence was high going into the final but they just missed out on the gold medal to London but both girls were delighted to come away with a silver and it rounded off a fantastic day for the Greater Manchester team.

Coach Les Hall, who was at the finals supporting his athletes, was delighted and said: "All four athletes performed at national level and did themselves and Bolton United Harriers proud.”

Elsewhere, Daryl Bentley clocked 46:26 on his way to 58th out of 221 at the Bull Hill fell race from Hawkshaw, while the Astley Park 4.6M trail race in Chorley (third in the series) saw two senior Blue Vests on the podium out of the 111-strong field.

First was Anthony Valentine (24:21) and Simon Dally (26:12) was third.

Toby Coop also completed the juniors’ race in 5:38.

The We Love Manchester 10K saw John Grimshaw (51:53) and Ged Tucker (61:49) compete in sweltering conditions at the Etihad Campus.

Meanwhile, Tuesday’s Rochdale 10K saw several Blue Vests compete on the roads: 21st Christian Pickford (38:24), 65th Ken Fowler (43:29), 185th John Grimshaw (53:59), 262nd Ged Tucker (1:05:45). 

Harrier Julia Winogrodzka won the under-13 girls pentathlon at the Scottish National Combined Events Championships at the weekend.

Competing as a visiting athlete, the young Blue Vest cleared 1.42m in the high jump – a new personal best leaving her tied in third place after the event.

Next was the 70m hurdles and, with a very strong tailwind, Julia struggled a bit with the tight spacing of the hurdles.

Her 11.63s, however, was good enough for victory and then came her favourite event – the long jump.

She put in a great effort with each subsequent jump being better than the previous one – 4.95m followed by 5.02m and a finish of 5.10m – strengthening her position as the current best long jumper in UK in her age group.

Subsequently Julia finished second in the shot put with a throw of 8.26m – another PB which put her well in front in the overall pentathlon standings before the last event – the 800m – in which she clocked yet another PB with a time of 2:39.77 for fifth place.

It all meant she won the pentathlon with a total score of 2,718 points, putting her fourth on the all-time list.