BAC athletes take on top level competition at England Athletics Indoor Championships
BAC members Koye Sule, Freddie Steele and Donncha Blake put in some fine performances against some of the country’s best young athletes at the 2025 England Athletics U-15/U-17/U-20 Indoor Championships in Sheffield over the weekend of February 8/9.
With all the participants having to meet specified entry standards, the level of competition was very high so just competing at the event was already an achievement. In fact, one of BAC’s athletes went close to making it through from his heat into a semi-final and two recorded SBs (season’s bests), one of which was a new club record.
On the track, junior athlete Koye finished 4th in his heat of the U-17M 400m with an SB of 54.28 seconds but got very close to an even better result. The 400m indoors is a two-lap race – the first lap is in lanes and after that it’s a free-for-all, with the aim being to secure a good position, hopefully in lane 1, going into the final bend. Koye went out hard, which is generally considered to be the best way to run an indoors 400m, and after one lap was leading with a small gap to the second and third runners. Going into the final bend, Koye still had the advantage but then tired over the last 60 metres and was overtaken by some of the other runners.
Elsewhere on the track, Freddie finished 5th in his heat of the U-20M 60m in 7.11 seconds and 4th in a heat of the U-20M 200m in an SB of 23.02 seconds. The calibre of the athletes he was competing against can be gauged by the fact that the prize for winning an U-20 event at the championships is an England call-up to compete in an indoor international in Cardiff later this month − so the standard is international quality! In the 60m, Freddie made an average start but put in a fast finish and only just got nudged out of getting through to the next round by 5/100ths of a second. The quality of athletes was just as good in the 200m run the next day and again Freddie ran well to notch an SB.
In the field events, Donncha Blake finished 8th in the U-20M pole vault with an SB clearance of 4.15 metres. That height was also a new BAC indoor club record, just beating the 4.10m he set last year.
Thanks to Veteran athlete, coach and official David Brown who was invited to officiate at the event.
RESULTS on Power of 10: https://www.thepowerof10.info/results/results.aspx?meetingid=664768