by Stuart Weir
Naomi Ogbeta, Triple Jump, photo by Getty Images / British Athletics
This is the final piece of on the 2020 SPAR British Indoor Championships, by Stuart Weir. The championships, held in the time of coronavirus, has complicated the indoor season. This is the final piece of some of the events on Day 2. We thank Stuart Weir on his efforts and love of the sport…
Day 2 Round Up
Naomi Ogbeta won the Triple jump with 13.83. Only 21, this was her third consecutive British Indoor title and she has also won the last three outdoor national championships. She has been 3rd in the European Under 20s and fourth in the Under 23s. While not yet jumping world class distances, she is moving in the right direction. She said, “This is my sixth British title and that was exactly what I wanted today to be about. The feeling never wears off when you win a British title and this one is just as sweet as the first one”. In the absence of Ben Williams, the current stand-out GB triple-jumper, the men’s competition was won by Michael Puplampu with 16:21.
Tom Gale won the men’s high jump with 2:27. He was partly satisfied, saying: “I’m feeling really good, but I’m annoyed, because I thought that a 2.32m was there today. I’ve walked in today knowing that in previous years I’ve won because the best guys weren’t here but today, they were and I won, so I can be happy. Having the Olympic qualifier behind me is a big thing so outdoors, let’s go have some fun”.
Third-placer, Chris Baker, said: “It was going well until I didn’t clear the bar”. Well, Yes, Chris. That is really a summary of the high-jump. In fourth place was Chris Kandu but today he couldn’t.
Morgan Lake, 4th in the last World Indoors and with a PR of 1.96, was the clear favorite in the women’s high jump. However, she failed at 1.87, settled for second and made no excuses: “I don’t know what went wrong, I don’t really have any words to sum up how awful that was”.
Bethan Partridge won with 1.87 but her celebration was also muted: “It feel great to get the win, but I’m frustrated slightly because I knew I was capable of clearing the next height”.
The winners of the 1500s were Holly Archer (4:21.99) and George Mills (3:50.69). The non-championship distance 200m races were won by Andrew Morgan-Harrison (21.20) and Ama Pipi (23.23).
Of course, you can moan about the standard of some events being low and the absence of many of our top athletes but I watched a lot of excellent competition over the weekend. What was particularly impressive was seeing a significant number of teenagers given the chance to compete. They will only learn from this experience of elite competition, whatever their result. And remember it is February and who wants to be in peak form so early in an Olympic year.
2020 SPAR British Indoor Athletics Championships, photo by Getty Images / British Athletics
