The GB Championships and selection trials explained
It all started at 11:40 AM on Saturday and finished just before 7:30 PM. As Genesis chapter 1 says, “the morning on the evening was the first day”. It used to be a three-day event, including Friday night. But that seemed a lot of effort for a 2-hour Friday program – only events like the 400m required three rounds on consecutive days. Now the entry standard for the 400 is higher, and only two rounds are held. What other sport gives you 8 hours of action for $60 – and there were some cheaper seats available?
The event operates at 3 levels.
At the simplest level, it is the British championship. The winner of each discipline can describe himself as the British champion for the coming year.
Then there is selection for the upcoming championship. This year, the European Championship, which is a home event taking place in Birmingham, is a more attractive option than usual. The first two finishers in each event, provided they have the qualifying time/distance, are automatically selected. A third place is at the selectors’ discretion.
It is appropriate to distinguish these two categories, as not every event winner will have the required standard for the championship. For example, Britain has not had a male steeplechaser in a championship for several years.
The championships also represent the highlight of their careers for club athletes. Instead of competing in front of the proverbial man and a dog, they find themselves competing in the national athletics stadium in front of 10,000 people.
Don’t think of the American model of sports scholarships, intercollegiate competitions and sponsorship.
The lifeblood of track and field in Britain is the local club, which athletes pay to join and where they train two evenings per week as a group and compete against other clubs in an utterly amateur environment.
Take Hannah Cameron, a 28-year-old club 800-meter runner with a PR of 2:03, who meets the standard to qualify for the national championship. Then she discovers that she’s running in the same prelim as Georgia Hunter-Bell, Olympic and world medalist. In what other sport could that happen?
With every discipline included, there is a wide range of ability. GB is always stronger at running than throwing, for example. Take the women’s steeplechase as an example. The winner, Elise Thorner, would not be out of place in any race on the world stage. But her victory was largely a procession. Only nine women had the required standard to be included in the race, and three of them were teenagers.
Another aspect of the national championship is that it offers fans the chance to see world-class track and field, with Jake Wightman, Amy Hunt, Dina Asher-Smith, Matt Hudson-Smith, Amber Anning, and others competing. It was lovely to see these stars signing autographs, posing for selfies and generally putting themselves out to make someone’s day.
There were a number of para-athletics events that gave athletes a chance to compete on the big stage in front of a crowd. While there was a new heptathlon (or decathlon) in the program, there was one elite multi-eventer who was getting her money’s worth by entering the 100 metres hurdles, the long jump, and the shot put to practise going from one event to the next in a short time.
Saturday is a long day, but it really does succeed in bridging the gap between grassroots and elite and showing the pathway from one to the other.
The Sunday programme is more elite, lasting just five hours with more than 20 finals.
