Mention should be made with regards to the U15s Open Pentathlon competition held two weekends ago on 25th March where Kacey Walters was, once again, the sole representative for Cambridge Harriers in this fantastic event. With 30+ under 15s girls currently signed up and competing for the club, hopefully we will get a better attendance at the next event as it is a wonderful opportunity to try out different events you’ve never tried before. The competition itself is fun and there is a real sense of camaraderie as you spend all day with the people you are competing against going from event to event with each other and often with the same officials who really try to make it fun for the girls.
Even though the individual events are fiercely competed for, I have never been to any competition where right at the end when everyone is tired and running the dreaded 800m, competitors cheer on each other with shouts of encouragement, it is lovely to witness. There are proper rest times in between events so no rushing from event to event as for normal meets, I really am surprised that more athletes from our club (that’s male and female athletes right across all age groups) don’t take part, and I hope that there will be an increase in attendees at the next event. It doesn’t matter if you are not strong in all the events, you will be strong in 2 or 3 and it is still worth taking part in it for the experience alone.
Despite being ill and off school the week before the event, Kacey still wanted to take part in this event which was entered into by 32 other athletes, half of them being year 2 under 15s, and she came away with a new Pentathlon PB of 2397 points and 12th place, up on her previous PB of 2084 points which gained her 3rd place at the Kent County Combined Events Championships in August last year, such was the standard of this open competition, and despite running an 800m time of 3.11 (down from her usual 800m time of circa 3mins, which was not surprising not being at her best), she still managed to gain 4 new PBs which was a great personal achievement – the individual results were as follows:-