Charlie is the darling of the crowd at indoor season’s finale

THE indoor athletics season finished on a high when Gateshead College held the final fixture of a campaign which has seen increased numbers taking part.

However, the highlight of the meeting was a superb pole vault competition which would have topped many meetings on the domestic circuit.

Those who stayed on witnessed superb vaulting, especially the spectators who had a bird’s eye view of the event from the balcony looking down on the proceedings.

Northumbria University’s Charlie Myers, who uses the Gateshead facilities as his training base, has been in fine form this winter under the guidance of Chris Boundy - and he rose to the occasion to finish in second place after clearing 5.30 metres.

However, the current Scottish indoor champion had no reason to be disappointed as he finished runner-up behind 2015 European junior gold medalist and world junior silver medalist Adam Hague.

The Sheffield athlete was making his first appearance in the North East since finishing second in the English Schools’ Championships at the International Stadium in 2012.

However, the support he received this time round was as if he was one of our own and when he cleared his winning height of 5.40m the cheers around the arena were almost deafening.

The spectators had their money’s worth for in third place was Tynesidebased Gregor MacLean, the Scottish international on the comeback trail after tearing his hamstring in the warm-up to the Glasgow Commonwealth Games in 2014.

Since then it has been a long, hard road for the Dundee-born vaulter but he showed signs things are now on the right track after clearing 5m - a height he used to vault regularly before his nasty injury.

To cap a fine senior competition, Wakefield’s George Heppinstal cleared 4.50m for fourth place.

As well as the pole vault many athletes, both senior and junior, used the final indoor meeting as a springboard to outdoor competition with the first meeting of the Start Fitness-supported North Eastern Grand Prix scheduled for just three weeks’ time at Monkton Stadium.