A team of 29 highly talented Under 11 year old athletes represented the Kent London McCain Athletics Network (KLAN) in the Aviva Fun in Athletics (London Region) Festival on Saturday 14 January 2011 at the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre.

The team comprising of young athletes from the Bees Academy, based in Bromley, Bexley Tigers and the Cambridge Harriers Academy produced some outstanding performances on the day. Cheered on by a large group of enthusiastic parents and siblings, the Girls team finished the day in second position on 464 points, only 23 points behind winners Central London - Wandsworth. After 3 hours of high tempo competition the boy’s team finished in third place on 458 points only 15 points behind winners Central London - Wandsworth. Both teams finish one place higher than last year and combining the boys and girls results the KLAN team came second overall on 922 against 960 for the winners. Next year we will aim to go one better!

For some of the team it was their first taste of Sportshall competition which comprises of 17 different events covering of running, jumping, throwing, balance and agility tests. On the afternoon the girl’s team produced 2 individual winners: Annie Ponulak – Chest Push and Eloise Locke – Javelin there were also two relay victories for the girls in the 1+1 Lap race when Gabrielle Dalsan and Mhairi Brooks teamed up to win by a big margin as did Nia Gornell and Eloise Locke in the 6 Lap Paarlauf. Katia Cienciala – Vertical Jump and Imogen Allen – Balance Test were both 2nd. In the boy’s event there were victories for Corben Randall in the Balance Test and Jason Okusanya in the Chest Push. George Piddington, Ronnie Stowell and Anthony Musoke combined to win to win the High Stepper event. Johnathan Mann was 2nd in the Balance Test with Robert Reeves and William Butterworth sharing 2nd place in the Target Throw event.

With the competition involving so many events and participants the four team managers Rachel and Lauren Blackie and Mick Jones (all from the Bees Academy) and Laura Crane (Bexley Tigers), supported by Paul Slater (Bexley Tigers) and Jessica Jones (Bees Academy) were kept on their toes all afternoon.

Thanks also to Liz Slater who officiated all afternoon and to Rose Bennett who took the team photographs.

“All team members gave 100% effort and it was a pleasure supporting this talented group of young athletes who performed at a very high level proving that all the hard work and commitment that they and their coaches put into their weekly training sessions was paying dividends.” said Paul Patten.

A full set of the results can be viewed from http://www.sportshall.org/VTL/AvivaFIA2012.aspx The following day three of the team, Imogen Allen, Karina Harris and Jason Okusanya represented Kent and all had victories in the Southern inter-counties event.

Report written by Paul Patten 18/1/2012.