World Youth Championships Lille 6 - 10 July

Action in these Championships got underway this morning. Will write in more detail on this when I've got time - first results are filtering in, these courtesy of Guto Nyth Bran on the AW messageboard:

M Discus Q
Nick Percy 56.48 Q 10th

W 100H r1
Yasmin Miller 13.78 Q 1st

M 800 r1
William Gurton 1.52.8 Q 3rd
Eliott Slade 1.52.2 Q 3rd

W1500 r1
Georgia Peel 4.19.14 Q 3rd

Just to add to the above news, the above running results are where they finished in their respective heats. Yasmin Miller for example had the 5th best time overall.

Full details are on http://www.iaaf.org/wyc11/index.html

Odane Skeen appears to have dropped out of the 100m. Blows the event wide open by my money. Think the GB lad could stand a good chance.

So France has been a good venue for our cyclists this week - Geraint Thomas, David Millar and Bradley Wiggins are all in the top-10 of the Tour de France at the moment - will it give as much joy to our young athletes? Just to update this morning's proceedings - Sophie McKinna has qualified 2nd with 14.27m in the shot behind the Chinese Tiangian Guo. Also Chijindu Ujah finished 2nd in his heat to advance through the round in the boy's 100m, clocking 10.77, behind Aussie Jarrod Geddes - interestingly the fastest qualifier in the first round here is Aussie Hugh Donovan with 10.60. The USA, Jamaica and Canada are prominent in that event. This afternoon's session kicks off at 3pm BST.

Zak Seddon has had a good run in the steeplechase too, clocking 5:46.98 for qualification in 3rd and a PB.

Well behind Kenyan 'sixteen' year old Kipruto who ran 5:31.

Two medal chances today. Nick Percy and Sophie McKinna. Unlikely for Nick but possible for Sophie, whose final is currently live.

Silver for Sophie in the women's shot, just behing a chinese lady. Nick has PB'd in his men's discuss final but just outside the medals going into the 4th round.

Nick rather fell away after that PB to finish a still credible 7th.

On the track this afternoon Alex Boyce won his 400m heat in 48.71 - a PB for him (I'm still mystified as to why Clovis Asong wasn't selected for these Champs), and Hayley McLean finished 3rd in her 400m Hurdles heat in 1:00.85. Nick Percy's 58.95m in the discus takes him to No 2 on the UK under-17 all time list behind Emeka Udechucku. Watching the Discus I was struck by the contrast between Youth and Senior athletics, the winner Fredrick Dacres has an extraordinarily slight build for a heavy throws competitor. He counteracted this by having an extremely quick arm, however.

Overall a really encouraging day for the British team with a medal in an event we've never won anything in before, and every athlete either made a final or progressed through their heat. Tomorrow morning attention will focus on the Juddernaught, as she starts her bid to win the 800m title.

Keep up the updates coming folks - fascinating stuff!

A couple of finals with possible GB interest later today.

Chijindu Ujah is the 8th fastest in the 100 metres semi-finals, and therefore has a reasonable chance of making the final. Yasmine Miller in the 100 metres hurdles is the sixth fastest in hers, and has a better chance of making the final. Unlikely either of them to medal.

Hayley McLean smashed her PB and is the second fastest qualifier for Saturday's 400 metres hurdles final.

Things to note - some of the semis are 3 "semis" making qualification more difficult.

Also no GB representation at

W100m
W400m
M3000m
W3000m
M400h
M TJ
W TJ
M LJ
W HJ
M SP
W JT

amongst others

teassoc wrote:A couple of finals with possible GB interest later today.

Chijindu Ujah is the 8th fastest in the 100 metres semi-finals, and therefore has a reasonable chance of making the final. Yasmine Miller in the 100 metres hurdles is the sixth fastest in hers, and has a better chance of making the final. Unlikely either of them to medal.

Hayley McLean smashed her PB and is the second fastest qualifier for Saturday's 400 metres hurdles final.

Well Chijindu Ujah made it to the final and is in with a chance of a medal. Sadly Yasmine Miller didn't.

Both boys failed to make it to the 800 metres final.

or
DTW

Desiree Hnery fastest qualifier in W200m.

Louisa James (55.20) and Kimberley Reed (54.62) through in WHT. Only 2 girls made the automatic 55.50

Amy Eloise Neal scraped through as last qualifier in W2000SC

Nethaneel Mitchell- Blake through into the next round M200m

GB down in 17th spot in the medals table. One medal after 3 days must seem a bit of a disappointment to most. Placings table doesn't provide any further comfort.

Things should improve these next two days though.

Mixed news for Jazmin Sawyers in the Heptathlon, she set PBs in the long jump and the javelin today - her mark in the long jump 6.10m would've made her equal best qualifier in the individual event. However, her 28.01m effort in the javelin was only 25th best and well down on the 46.83m throw by Eva Vivod of Slovenia. She current lies 5th with the 800m to go. Sawyers seems to be the latest in a long line of multi-eventers from the UK who are really runner/jumpers and are distinctly average at throwing (hello Kelly Southerton, hello Daniel Awde). This is the precisely the sort of thing that Charles Van Commenee should 1) notice and 2) do a lot about.

Better news from the 200m, where Desiree Henry qualifies fastest for the final, winning her heat in 23.38. The benchmark for junior 200m is often said to be 23.50 so that's a really top-class effort by Henry.

What should he do about it?

Sack all the multi eventers with good long jumps and poor javelins and bring some new ones in?

I was more thinking that UKA should assign more and better throws coaches to these athletes to improve their conditioning and technique for throws. It's no coincidence that virtually none of our leading multi-eventers are outstanding throwers. CVC has been a multi-event coach in the past so it's exactly the sort of issue he should be adept at addressing.

More on Desiree Henry - her 23.38 performance in the 200m takes her to 4th in the all-time UK under-17 list. It puts her ahead of some major names such as Amy Spencer, Linsey MacDonald, Vernicha James and Katherine Merry.

Gold for Louisa James in the women's hammer. Bronze in the women's PV for Lucie Bryan.

What an amazing day for heavy throws - Louisa James has taken the girl's Hammer title with her 2nd round effort of 57.13m. Earlier in the afternoon Lucy Bryan also won Bronze in the Pole Vault, her 4.10m enabled her to finish behind eventual winner Desiree Singh of Germany who vaulted 4.25m. A gutsy performance in the 1500m yielded 4th for Georgia Peel, who clocked a season's best 4:16.36. Predictably three East Africans were well ahead of the field on the final lap, with Kenyan Faith Kipyegon victorious in 4:09.48. Perhaps the stand out performance of the day (and the championships so far) was by Leonard Kosencha of Kenya who won the boy's 800m title in 1:44.08 - he looked pretty comfortable when he crossed the line too.

Lucy Bryan's bronze in the pole vault was a PB of 4.10m, a new UK U17 best. The previous mark belonged to Katie Byres with 4.05m.

Haha, 1:44.08 in the World Youth Championships?

Those Kenyans are really taking the Michael this year.

I am going to stick my neck out and say that he's certainly a lot older than his 'official' age.

Gutted for Peel too, no doubt at least one those in front of her was overage too.

Great results for Louisa James and Lucy Bryan though.

Desiree Henry wins the 200m in a new PB of 23.25, this takes her to 3rd on the UK U17 all-time list and is a World Youth Lead time. Her win also bumps GB up to 4th in the medals table, behind Kenya, USA and China. It's great to see her string a set of performances together and win a title with a super fast time. I hope it's the first of many landmark performances from her!

Later this afternoon Jessica Judd, Kate Snowden, James McMurray and Robbie Farnham-Rose will be running in the middle distance finals (also young Irish lad Ruairi Finnegan in the 1500m). Best of luck to them, especially Judd who's got her work cut out against two quick American girls.

Two more medal chances - both good bets for Judd in the 800m and either of the two brits in the 1500m.

GB currently 7th in the medal table (the official Iaaf). Ahead of Russia, France and Germany. Funnily enough, 7th also according to placings.

A couple more medals might take us higher up the table. 4th would have been brilliant.

Jessica Judd won Bronze in the 800m with 2:03.43 behind Ajee Wilson and Chunju Wang. Sounds like Judd really took this out - she led at the bell with 59.62. Maybe she got a little excited, having held herself back through the rounds, but she's already achieved a lot this year and was running against older girls than her. Katie Snowden finished 7th in 2:05.64. Later on James McMurray finished 6th in the 1500m, but broke the UK U17 record previously held by Steve Cram. McMurray clocked a sensational 3:46.51. The standard in this event is very very high, however and was won by Teshome Dirirsa of Ethiopia in 3:39.13 - the world lead in this event is an insane 3:35. Robbie Farnham-Rose clocked a PB in 8th - 3:47.60 - this was also inside Cram's old record of 3:37.7 from Gateshead in 1977.