TWO young Bolton Harriers picked up gold medals running the relay for Birmingham University at this year’s British University Championships.

Olivia Kimbowa and Hannah Kelly both pulled on the red vest of Birmingham to compete in the 400m and the 400m relay.

In the flat 400, Kimbowa qualified for the semi-final and ran a fantastic race in a time of 57.71secs to finish third but just missed out on the final by one place.

Kelly went one better and qualified for the final by winning both her heat and the semi.

The final proved to be a shoot out between Kelly and Loughborough student Natasha Harrison and Kelly did exactly what coach Les Hall wanted - she ran good, better, best -a good heat, a better semi and the best in the final. She ran a personal-best time in the final of 54.03 but just missed out on gold by a tiny margin.

Not to be outdone, though, the pair ran the first two legs in the relay to put their team in a winning position which they held on to on the last leg to take away a well-deserved gold medal each.

Two Harriers club-mates were also involved at Chelmsford.

Edge Hill student Rebecca Weekes had a busy weekend competing in the 400m hurdles, 200m and the 4x400m relay.

In her preferred event, the 400m hurdles, Weekes ran a measured heat to finish fourth in a season’s best 67.91 seconds to qualify for the semi-final.

In the semi, she ran even better to record a PB of 66.18 seconds. In the 200m she ran another season’s best of 26.99 seconds and then was part of the university relay team that finished sixth in their heat.

Ben To was the only representative from UCLAN to make the start line.

In his heat, he ran 11.04 seconds, which is just outside his PB, and duly qualified for the semi-final.

In his next race he ran much better and smashed his PB, breaking through the elusive 11-seconds barrier (the mark of a top male sprinter) to record 10.92 seconds.

Afterwards, he was delighted with the run and said: “I felt so strong and now I’ve broken 11 seconds I think I can run even faster.”

He also competed in the 200m where he made the semi-final - his best time of the weekend 22.72.