Young Habbies bag more records
After the success of the Kilbarchan senior 4 x 200m squad breaking the Scottish club record, it was the turn of the cream of the club’s young middle distance athletes to show off their talents.
Jack Patton’s ambitious target for this year is GB selection for the World Under20 Track and Field Championships to be held in Columbia.
Competing at the Emirates Invitational recently Jack, coached by Robert Hawkins, in only his second track outing in six months broke the Scottish National Indoor Under- 20 1500m record in an incredible time of 3:46.79.
That was a huge 1.19 seconds inside the previous record, set by Joe Ewing of Edinburgh Athletic Club.
Mark Nixon, Scottish Athletics national endurance coach, was full of praise for the talented young runner.
Nixon said: “Despite two disruptive seasons it was great to see Jack back on a track and breaking a national record.
“His name will appear on the record books for evermore.
“Everyone at Scottish Athletics wish him continued success on the track.”
The Emirates this week also hosted the Scottish Schools Indoor Track and Field Championship.
Not to be outdone by his older brother, Oliver Patton - also in the 1500m - broke the Scottish Schools national record by an incredible ten seconds in a time of 3:58.78.
This performance was remarkable as it also lowered the Scottish national indoor Under-17 age group record that had stood for 41 years.
However, the nature of records is that they are always broken eventually and only ten minutes later Corey Campbell lowered Oliver’s time by a further three seconds.
Kilbarchan’s Amy Teasdale has been concentrating on cross country during the winter, but switched to the track to contest the Scottish Schools 1500m.
In the Under-16 event Amy triumphed against athletes from schools throughout Scotland to win her first national title by two seconds in 4:41.81.
Outside of indoor arenas, at a stormy Battery Park in Greenock the annual Renfrewshire Road Races were hosted by Inverclyde AC.
For many athletes this would be the final endurance event before the National Cross Country Championship at the end of February.
At the end of the day Kilbarchan had two county champions and a host of silver and bronze individual and team medals.
Winners on the day were Under-13 talent Alistair Street and Under-17 star Luke Lindsay.
A silver medal was won by Amy Teasdale (Under-15) and bronze medals by Emma Nicholson (Under-11), Josh McKinley (Under-17) and Robbie Fergusson in the senior men’s race.
Next on the running calendar are the Scottish Indoor Age Group Championships and the National Cross Country Championships.