Following her very successful cross-country season and recent qualification for the Euro U18 Championships, Sonny headed for the ESAA Championships at Birmingham in good spirits, but also now with the knowledge she was now the clear favourite and all the others would be gunning for her. We decided to race the 1500m as it's her favourite event, which was also a good speed warm-up for the 3000m to come next week in Rieti.
She was more nervous than I have seen her for a while as the heats approached, but once she got on the track she relaxed and comfortably qualified, while reserving as much energy as possible in the soaring temperatures for the final.
Sonny's plan was to sit on the shoulder of whoever led, avoid getting boxed in and control the race from there, then kick when she felt ready. All this she did perfectly and with 300m to go started to go through the gears, stretching them out from the front. All went well until the last few metres when another athlete came surging through. Sonny responded and did make it across the line in first place, but managed yet again to give her coach another heart attack!
Once recovered from the shock, Sonny was beaming away as it's her first National track title and it has given her a clean sweep of the national titles on and off the track, which is mightily impressive and way beyond our expectations for the year.
The only downside is she can't compete for England at the SIAB meet because it's the same weekend as the Euro U18. Most can imagine what we think about that on a planning level!
However, it's now on to Rieti for her first major international championships.
Good luck Sonny, you have so earned this for all the dedication you have put in, especially during a GCSE year!
