Of the four current students competing, two returned with medals, as postgraduate students Holly Bradshaw (coach: Scott Simpson) and Jamie Webb (Adrian Webb/Matt Yates) won bronze medals in the women’s pole vault and men’s 800m respectively. Although Bradshaw was favourite for the gold, top spot eventually went to the Swiss athlete Angelica Moser with a new PB of 4.75m.
Bradshaw tweeted after her competition, “I set out this indoors with the mindset of ‘anything is possible’. I’m proud of what I’ve achieved. Yesterday was absolutely not the day I had hoped for, despite the disappointment I feel, I am incredibly grateful. The 2 girls jumped incredibly well, huge congrats to them”.
Webb was going into the 800m with the fastest time in the field, though he knew a medal wouldn’t come easy, especially when up against former World Champions Adam Kszczot and Pierre-Ambroise Bosse. He ran his second fastest ever indoor time in the semi finals to qualify for the final, where he was met with three world class Poles looking to take home advantage.
A closely fought race saw Webb front run for 600m of the 800m race, being overtaken by Patryk Dobek and Mateusz Borkowski in the very late stages of the race for a well earnt third place.
The women’s high jump qualifying round will be one that Emily Borthwick (Fuzz Caan) won’t forget in a while as she made her GB Senior debut, broke her PB, jumped over 1.90m for the first time and topped it off with securing her place in the final, where she finished in 8th place.
She will now have the Olympic qualifying mark of 1.96 in her sights. It’s a mark that Morgan Lake (Caan), has already achieved this season, but unfortunately couldn’t replicate in the qualifying round. She finished her competition with a jump of 1.87m, just outside the height needed to see her through to the final.
There were other strong performances from former students including Jessie Knight (Marina Armstrong) who made the semi final of the individual women’s 400m, and helped the 4 x 400m relay team to a brilliant silver medal.
Joel Kahn (Deidre Elmhirst) equipped himself well by following up his PB jump at Loughborough with a 2.16m jump in the men’s high jump qualifying round. Guy Learmonth (Justin Rinaldi) came a solid 4th place in the men’s 800m semi final with 1:47.92 which unfortunately wasn’t enough to make the final, and Harry Aikines-Aryeetey (Benke Blomkvist) also made his semi final, equalling his 60m season’s best of 6.67 to finish 6th.