FRED SENSATIONAL AS MEDALS AND PB's RAIN IN!

As County Championship medals rained in on Trackspeed1-UK athletes at the weekend, Fred Afrifa established himself as the new sensation to emerge from a squad internationally renown for converting raw talent into star quality.

The 18-year-old from Croydon stunned the crowd at the Surrey County Championships, at Kings Meadow, as he flew home in the under-20 400 metres final to a spectacular 48.61 seconds.  Not only was this the seventh fastest in the UK by any junior this year, it sliced just short of two seconds off his previous lifetime best for an event he has raced just four times in his life!

"I've been telling him for two years he is a quarter miler," said an absolutely jubilant coach, John Powell, "but I can't say I saw a time that fast coming just yet.  It was a perfectly executed race with tactics absolutely spot on!"

Fred Afrifa caused a sensation at the Surrey County
Championships clocking an incredible 48.61s to take
the under-20 title in only his fourth race ever over
the one-lap sprint.  He also took second in the 200m

Afrifa was pushed up the home straight all the way, but ended just over a tenth of a second ahead of second place to take the gold.  He joined an increasing number of his training group in various medals tables around the home counties, and added another himself with silver in the 200m 24 hours after his one-lap victory.

The Sussex sprints finals are notoriously poorly populated, but that did not deter in-form Jason Hussain to claim his umpteenth gold medals over both 100m and 200m.  On Saturday he clocked a fastest ever 21.2s 200m, albeit very slightly wind-aided with a +2.4m/s breeze behind him.

Twenty-four hours later he made it a double with a 10.9s 100m run to gold, but neither performance came without some controversy.  Both races were hand timed, a disappointing feature of the Championships at Crawley's K2 Centre, while the win in the 100m saw him obliterate the field, but he was given barely a half second margin ahead of second when video footage showed him clearly almost a second in front.

"It was very, very frustrating,"said Jason, "I had the race of my life, and I know perfectly well it was faster than 10.9.  I have no idea how they came up with that time, but there's nothing you can do now, so we move on."

Ishmael Smith-John, described by John Powell as one of his hardest working athletes over the past year, grabbed his first ever senior County medal in Ashford by taking second in the Kent 200m final.  This was despite a howling headwind that slowed everyone to significantly inferior times.  A day earlier, however, he had ripped his 100m lifetime best apart to clock 11.17s, missing out on a medal by just half of one tenth of a second!

Ishmael Smith-John took silver in the Kent 200m
final, with a lifetime's fastest 100m 24 hours earlier

"I was delighted Ishmael got a medal, and his PB in the 100m was richly deserved," said John Powell.  "He may not be among the superstars - yet - but this was just reward for some seriously hard graft throughout the winter, and I have absolutely no doubt that there is a lot more to come."

Elsewhere, Tope Nuga took silver in the Middlessex Women's 100m final, clocking 11.84, while there was an unfortunate twist of fate at the close of the Surrey event for Trackspeed1-UK's fast-improving sprinter Dean Hylton.

Cruising through the heats of the senior men's 100m, he made a poor decision to run the final despite an uncomfortable hamstring, and paid a dear penalty with a hamstring pull at the line, albeit grabbing silver in a blanket finish.  He clocked 10.94 with second to sixth covered by just  four hundredths of a second.

Training partner Oweka Wanogho took fifth in the same final, having run his fastest 200m in three years the day before clocking 21.98 to take silver.

Dean Hylton (blue/black vest) limps to second in the Surrey 100m final
with training partner Oweka Wanogho fifth (far side to left of white vest)

"Dean should not have run the final," said John Powell, "and now he will be lucky to make the British Trials in July.  It's frustrating, especially with a huge talent like him who we had down to run pretty quickly this year despite a lack of work during the winter."

Overall it was a spectacular weekend for Trackspeed1-UK athletes.  Eight medals from ten competing athletes was a pretty impressive haul, especially with most of them coming with personal best performances.

Nathan Gilbert was one of the unlucky ones, finishing fourth in the middlesex 100m final, but he clocked a fastest ever 100m in 10.70s, contesting the first race of his 2015 summer season proper after a catalogue of injury issues had seriously curtailed his winter preparations.

Medals and PB's galore during Counties weekend for Trackspeed1-UK
Top: Jason Hussain - Sussex 100m, 200m gold
Middle: Fred Afrifa - Surrey 400m gold and 200m silver
Bottom: Dean Hylton - Surrey 100m silver