Herne Hill Harriers round-up: Sriskandarajah clocks new 800m PB in Norman Park

English Schools gold medallist and England U15 boys silver medallist Keeran Sriskandarajah followed up his recent 400m PB of 53.20 with an excellent new 800m PB of 1:58.44 racing at the Blackheath & Bromley Open meeting in Norman Park, writes Geoff Jerwood.

His time last Friday elevates him to second place in the UK U15 boys 800m rankings in 2021 and sees him get closer to a club age group record which dates back to 1973.

Sriskandarajah trains with the Harriers’ young athletes middle distance group in which recent Tokyo Olympic Games 1,500m semi-finalist Katie Snowden began her athletics journey 15 years ago. Two other U15 group members also raced at Bromley, Alex Wilson clocking 2:13.04, a PB by more than two seconds and his brother Warren ran 2:17.50. Senior athlete Steph Mitchell also raced 800m and recorded a season’s best 2:25.58.

Saturday saw some very fast racing at Sutcliffe Park in the final BMC Grand Prix meeting of the season where two Olympians raced for the first time since Tokyo. Arlo Ludewick was inspired to improve his recent 800m PB by half a second with 1:53.18 placing second in the D race. Annabel Hobday (U20) ran a PB of 2:13.70 ahead of Zoe Tompkins (2:17.90) in the women’s C 800m. Mike Cummings clocked a season’s best 1500m of 4:00.50.

The final Southern Athletics League fixture of the season took place in Battersea Park earlier in the afternoon.
Harriers had more field event athletes competing than in the previous league matches this year, which made a big difference to the overall team performance and score being more competitive in third place, not far behind the match winners.

Women’s A string event winners for Herne Hill were Niyah Costley in the 100m and long jump, a returning Hannah Edwards in the 800m and new member Elspeth Jamieson was a good winner in the javelin.

The 4x100m relay team of Jaydine Robinson, Tia Mehie, Lizlove Fenning and Saskia King were also clear winners. King was one of the B string winners, taking the 100m, with Robinson winning the B long jump and Phoebe Bowen the B 800m.

In the men’s events, Isaac Ogunlade won the A string 400m hurdles and later placed second in the A 200m.

Jack Dickenson front ran the final 4km of his winning 5,000m race, with Jeff Cunningham second finisher and B string winner.

Cunningham was then second in the 2,000m steeplechase where Sam Knight made a welcome return, winning the B string. Nathan Latigo won the A long jump and the 4x400m team of Sam Camenzuli, Ogunlade, Denzel Boye and Kehinde Adenuga claimed victory in the final event of the afternoon.

Herne Hill U15 boys maintained their 100 per cent winning record in the Ebbisham League fixture at Carshalton on Sunday.