Herne Hill Harriers: Olympic hopefuls Kristal Awuah and Katie Snowden both in European action

BY GEOFF JERWOOD

Two Tokyo Olympic Games hopefuls from Herne Hill Harriers enjoyed a busy time racing in Europe last week.

Sprinter Kristal Awuah raced over 100m at the Paavo Nurmi Games in Turku, Finland last Tuesday and was just hundredths of a second outside her then season’s best as she clocked 11.49 for fourth place against a minus-0.7metres-per-second headwind.

She followed up with a race win on Thursday in Espoo in 11.51.

Awuah brought her best time for this year down to 11.39 in Geneva on Saturday, with a second winning performance in the space of three days.

Awuah moved up to fifth in the British women’s 100m rankings and is now top of the U23s for 2021.

She will hope to secure a place in the individual sprint events and the 4x100m relay squad at the British Athletics Championship and Olympic Trials meeting in Manchester.

Katie Snowden ran her second fastest 800m time as she finished a very close second in Prague in 2:01.58. Boxed in until the closing stages, Snowden only missed out on a win by two hundredths of a second at the line.

Snowden finished 10th in a stellar field at the Wanda Florence Golden Gala Diamond League meet last week – the fastest women’s 1500m race in the world this year

Her time of 4:03.86 was her second quickest and the second time she has achieved the Olympic 1,500m qualifying time.

Phoebe Anderson set a new club U20 women’s record in the 5,000m in 16:31.20 at the Watford British Milers Club Grand Prix meeting. As the second U20 finisher she will hopefully have earned her selection for the GB Juniors team for Tallinn next month. She moves up to second on this year’s British U20W 5,000m list.

Saskia Millard (U23) ran faster still to place fifth overall in the combined race and was fourth among her age group as she also clocked a season’s best of 16:12.90.

It is the second fastest track 5,000m run by a Herne Hill female – behind her own club senior women’s record set last September in the British Championships.

Millard will race at this year’s championships in Manchester, with the aim of running a PB to secure the qualifying time for the European U23 Championship which is also being staged in Tallinn just before the U20 event.

Other Harriers racing at Watford were Nick Dewar, who ran a good PB of 14.44.54 in the men’s D 5,000m and prolific racer Fiona de Mauny, who again improved her season’s best 800m time with 2:12.71.

The London Schools Athletics Association held their trials meeting on Saturday at Battersea Park for July’s English Schools Championship in Manchester. Event winners were Alexander Abebrese in the junior boys shot (15.21m), Harvey Kande in the intermediate boys 800m (2:08.25) and Phoebe Bowen in the the inter girls 3,000m (10.52.52), a solo victory in her first track race at this distance.

Isaac Ogunlade raced twice on Saturday with 400m hurdles heats and finals at the South of England Championship in Bedford and then followed up with his fastest time of the season in this event at Stratford on Sunday as he stopped the clock at 54.50. Michael Miller produced the fastest men’s 100m time by a club member this year (10.86), while in the women’s 100m races Lexus Ndiwe ran a PB (12.55).