Herne Hill Harriers’ round-up: Lily-Rose Brown unfazed by racing against Olympian Jessie Knight

Herne Hill Harriers enjoyed some good bank holiday results, mainly in track and field competition, writes Geoff Jerwood.

Saturday’s South London Athletics Network (SLAN) open meeting at Coulsdon attracted some top-quality athletes, including Tokyo Olympian and former Harrier Jessie Knight, who still holds the club women’s 400m record.

Knight was racing over 300m against men and one younger athlete. The latter was Herne Hill club U15 girls’ 300m record holder Lily-Rose Brown, now at U17 level. Although nervous, she was not overawed by coming up against one of her heroes.

Brown is coached by James McDonald, who has previously looked after both Knight and Katie Snowden. She ran her own race and maturely stayed n touch with the leaders. Her time of 40.02 was less than a second outside her PB and is well inside the English Schools’ qualifying time of 41.2. This performance ranks her third U17 nationally.

U20 Harry Bell made a big breakthrough in the 3,000m at the same meet. He recorded a PB of 9:04.45 to finish second in the second race, more than half a minute inside his previous best time.

Bell had a busy weekend as he raced again at the UK Youth Development League match in Lewes on Sunday. He put in a superb shift, competing in the 800m, 1,500m and 3,000m. He kicked off his afternoon placing second in the 1,500m in a PB of 4:16.98, then won a tactical 3,000m in 9:32.34 before filling in at 800m for team points.

Eliza Nicholson is new to the Harriers team but the U17 athlete is already making waves. She improved her already very good 3,000m PB by almost 20 seconds as she clocked 9:41.

Like Brown, she could also be a real force at the English Schools Championship later in the summer.

One of the club’s bigger senior stars in recent weeks is Georgie Grgec and she added to her growing reputation by placing second in a strong elite women’s race at the Comeback 5000 track meet in Battersea Park on Friday evening.

Only three seconds behind a breakthrough race winner who surprised everyone, Grgec was again on a first three podium for a big race with a 5,000m time of 15:52.16. This was only fractions of a second outside her PB from last season.

Harriers’ fastest man was Lewis Laylee (14:55.98), just a few seconds outside his PB. George Withers was similarly close to his best, kicking off with 16:01.17, while Simon Coombes went to the top of the early season UK M50 rankings with 16:12.73, also a new club record for this age group.

PBs were set by Ryan Willmott (16:20.44), only five days after a PB at the London Marathon, U20 Alex Jack (16:30.39), Greg Mills (17:10.22) and Micheal Tay, whose 17:26.57 saw him on the podium for placing third in the first open race of the day.

Saskia Millard placed fifth in one of the strongest events of the three days of big competition at the British Universities and Colleges Sports (BUCS) Championship at Sportcity in Manchester on Monday.

Millard ran her second fastest track 5,000m, her 16:07.04 was five seconds shy of her best.

San Antonio University student Ore Adamson recorded a wind-assisted long jump of 6.03m on Saturday and then a triple jump of 12.55m, also with a wind over the permitted limit, on Sunday at the Texas Invitational meet.

She backed up the latter with a legal wind jump of 12.28m, to back up her indoor 12.80m back in February which ranks her third senior woman and second U23W in the country.

Isaac Ogunlade ran his first 400m hurdles race of the season and posted a solid 55.56 at Coulsdon on Saturday.

In the 100m races there was a PB for U17M Rikaion Smith (11.34). Ella Rennie (U15) won her race in 12.68, as did U15B Yunas Amoo-Gottfried (12.77). Sasha Nolan (U13) was another race winner (14.28). Smith also clocked 23.12 for 200m.

Orla Carroll (U17) ran a 3,000m PB in 10:41.00, while in the 800m races U13B Zaccchaeus Kelman ran a superb 2:21.25 to rank sixth nationally in his age category, with a PB also for Edward Cunniffe (2:23.26). U15B Tommy Clerkin won his race in a PB of 2:16.94 and U20M Evan Cowell-New ran a PB of 2:14.14.

U17 women Lucy Wright and India Blakey ran 2:21.31 and 2:27.74 respectively. U15G Sophie Wright ran 2:36.41, with U13G Sophia Mendes running 2:40.81 and U15G Summer Mackay ran 2:42.44.

James Brown completed his first race at marathon distance to record 3:18.18 in the Belfast City event.