Jonathan Dumbutshena took a marvellous double gold at the South West Schools’ Track and Field Championships on a fine day for Swindon Harriers.
The club won 18 medals across the weekend at the Exeter Arena, including five gold medals and seven silver medals, with Dumbutshena’s searing wins in the 100 and 200 metres being the most impressive performance across the team.
Competing in the inter boys’ age group in both races, he raced home in under 11 seconds to take the 100-metre gold ahead of his training partner Emmanuel Daramola and then followed that up with a 200-metre to win to boot.
His coach Tony Jackson said: “What can I say, it was a brilliant day for the club’s athletes and Jonathan is right there where I wanted him to be at this stage of the season.
“I told the athletes they would need to step up a level for the South West Schools and they’ll have to do that again for the nationals next month.”
The third member of that group is Laila-Jae Belgrave and she was equally scorching in the 80-metre hurdles as she smashed her personal best time to win the race in 11.68 seconds, earning the club their third gold at the championships.
Representing Gloucestershire Lucy Bull duly won the junior girls javelin and then added silver in the discus, both again in qualifying distances for the nationals while Archie Kinneir smashed his personal best with a mighty throw of 51.07 metres to lift the inter-boys hammer title.
Abigail Hackley underlined her position as one of the club’s best young female sprinters with silver in the senior girls’ 400 metres and bronze in the 200 metres, clocking a personal best in the latter to claim a two-medal haul for the weekend.
There were also silver medals for Arthur Widdows in the inter-boys 400-metre hurdles, Holly Scott, who was leading the inter-girls hammer competition until the fourth and final round, Kalina Karacheva as she put in a very strong performance in the inter-girls high jump and pole vault newcomer Esha Bhalerao impressed greatly to finish on the second step of the podium.
There were also six bronze medals in the 18-medal haul to go along with the golds and silvers, in addition to Hackley third places for Billy Dickinson (senior hammer), Jesse Bryant (junior 800m), Elliot Cox (junior 80m hurdles), Ella Spencer (inter 1500m) and Lottie Harding (junior hammer).