WOKING AC member Lola Roake won a bronze medal when she represented Surrey at the prestigious English Schools’ Athletic Association Track & Field Championships.

The championships are the biggest held in the UK, with thousands of youngsters coming from across England to compete. 

To be selected is an achievement in itself, as only the top athletes in each event are picked by their county against very tough entry standards.

Over the years, future senior champions have competed.

The championships were held at the Alexander Stadium in Birmingham – which was used for the Commonwealth Games last summer – on Friday, June 30 and Saturday, July 1. 

The three Woking members taking part were all from the under-15 age group and did themselves extremely proud in their individual events. 

Roake took the headlines with a magnificent third place in the 1,500m.

After coming through her heat on Friday in one of the non-automatic qualifying places, she ran a really well-judged tactical race in the final and produced a strong finish in the last 150m to win bronze.

She narrowly missed out on the silver medal by just 0.01sec and was only 0.3sec behind the winner. 

This is a fantastic achievement by a talented and popular athlete who has been guided fantastically by her coaches Andrew Collings and Steve Gillingham.  

Roake’s training mate Jack Dormer was in action in the 800m.

Because of the high number of entries, qualification to the final was extremely difficult, with only the heat winners guaranteed to go through. 

The event was also one of the strongest in terms of depth of quality over the weekend. 

Dormer ran a great race in the heat, recording the third-best time of his career.

But he was pipped at the line and finished second, so just missed out on the final.

In the shot, Jack Harel was up against class opposition but did not let the occasion get to him. 

He produced a throw of 11.94m, the second-best of his career, to finish 12th overall. 

This was achieved after missing several months of training with a broken foot suffered in a skiing accident while on holiday.

Woking AC are very proud of all three athletes.

On Sunday, Woking’s under-11s up to under-17s were on top form in their final Wessex Young Athletes Track & Field League meeting of the season  at Aldershot.

The youngsters were burning up the track and were dominant, especially in the sprints. 

In the under-11 boys’ Quadkids competition, Gwyllam Hughes provided the fastest time of the day in the 75m.

And in the under-11 girls’ Quadkids section, Kyrah Snijman was the second fastest in the 75m and leapt the furthest in the long jump. 

Mia Mosko was a comfortable winner of the under-13 girls’ 100m after earlier emerging victorious from the long jump with a leap of 4.65m – both were into a strong headwind. 

Woking’s under-15 girls were really on fire in the sprints.

Eleanor Buckle dominated the A 100m and Sara-Louise Fordjour easily won the B 100m.

In addition, Evie Wiltshire won the non-scoring race. 

Buckle and Fordjour also comfortably won their respective 200m races, with the former running a personal-best time of 27.66sec.  

Sahil Vassanjee completed a double victory in the under-15 boys’ 100m and 200m, and Ben De’ath Green just missed out on the win in the B race.

De’ath Green was pipped on the line by 0.05sec.

Vassanjee and De’ath Green won their respective long-jump competitions. 

Nerys Tullet was second in the under-17 women’s 100m but went one better in the 300m, powering down the straight for victory in a time of 43.07sec.

Liam Trinidad was a narrow second in the under-17 men’s 100m, Dylan Lewis winning the B race. 

Earlier, Trinidad came out on top in the B 200m.

There were further impressive performances in the endurance events.

Sophie Price set a personal best in the under-15 girls’ 800m with a  very impressive time of 2min 18.85sec.

Team-mate Imogen Freeman followed her home in second place in a tie, just outside 2min 24sec. 

Price and Freeman went on to win their respective 300m races, both in personal-best times. 

Jacob Bowyer produced a storming finish in the under-15 boys’ 800m to win on the line in a personal-best time of 2min 6.42sec. This knocked 6sec off his best.

Woking starred in the 4x100m relays. 

The under-13 boys’ team of Arthur Embleton, Luke Wheeler, Harry Freeman and Lucas Pearman finished a narrow second, and the under-15 girls’ side of Buckle, Chloe Moore, Evie Wiltshire and Sara Louise Fordjour won by more than 10m. The time of 52.25sec was the girls’ best of the season.