Northern Juniors and Youths performed in their Championships as though "Big Bren" Foster was watching every move at Gateshead on June 21st. They upheld the tradition set at the North East outpost with records tumbling throughout the championship meeting. Indeed many are worthy of an encore at the Bayi jamboree later this month.
Hallamshire's Sebastian Coe ran as though the 1500m was a dress rehersal for a clash with the world record holder. The Yorkshireman opened with a lap of 57sec, taking a talented field of Malcolm Prince, Andy Armitage, National Youth cross-country champion John Mills and AAA Junior champion Mike Bateman by surprise. To their credit they never gave up the fight and Coe never gave up his attacking front running. He narrowly missed a personal best but dug a 5.8sec hole into the championship record, clocking 3:50.8. He looks capable of running 4sec faster but that would prove nothing at 18 years of age. Far better to run 14sec faster at 20 years of age and the way he is being guided steadily along, those sort of times could be achieved.
The sprinting reached new heights. Nigel Lake crashed through the Youths 200 in a championship best of 22.0, and the Junior events were shared equally by Earl Tulloch and Alan Bell. Earl Tulloch not only has a name that sounds American but runs like one. His bouncing sprint stride collected the 100m title from Bell with both clocking 10.8. The stopwatches again gave them equal honours in the 200, stopping at 21.9, with Bell throwing his body over first. John Ashton is like Bell, another Wakefield athlete with finishing power. He used it down the home straight in the 800 and beat the field.
Val Harrison's young brother Robbie brought another title to their household with a Youths 800 win, and Sheffield youngsters worked their way into the medal charts in the field events. Shaun Hughes whipped the shot 14.17, Dave Allan finished almost 5½ metres ahead of his discus rivals and three of their clubmates picked up place medals in the centre of the area, while their senior team of Ian Hague, Dave Oldfield, John Henson and John Sherwood mopped up the 4 x 400 senior title.
It was left to Mike Freary to keep Sheffield in check. The Bolton runner, who was winning medals before the Junior and Youths competitors were born, stretched his Northern 10,000m reign to his eighth year.
TJ; 1, T. Moore (ESH) 14.49/47'61"; 2, M. Harrison (Wake) 14.43/47'4"; 3. L. McGinley (Wall) 14.26/46'9½".
Ends
Source - Athletics Weekly - Saturday, 12/07/1975 by Joe Lancaster
Ref 2974