It was a successful day for Balfron High at the Scottish Schools pentathlon championships with a full set of Gold, Silver and Bronze medals for Tom & Matt Chandler and Anna Cameron.

A further gold medal for Dollar Academy’s Lucy Smith capped a successful day for the Central AC contingent as they battled against dreadful conditions with high wind and rain showers.

Tom Chandler was competing at this event for the final time and looking for his third consecutive gold. Competing on the over 17 boys pentathlon Tom led from the start with 11.15m in the shot and an excellent pb 15.48s in the 110m Hurdles to open up a 200 point lead.

A season’s best 6.61m long jump extended this further and put him within sight of the championship record. Tom battled hard in the 200m (23.70s) and 1500m (4:40.19) but strong winds meant the record was beyond his reach. However his final score of 3469 took the gold and was the second highest score ever and a new club record.

This was Tom’s second Scottish schools gold in as many days as the previous day he teamed up with triplets Johnathan, Lewis and Ben McGuire to win the 4x100m relay for Balfron High.

At the other end of the age groups Lucy Smith also led from the start in the S1 girls triathlon event after an excellent 1.45m high jump in a difficult wind, 9cm clear of the rest of the field. She followed this with 8.09m in the shot, the 2nd furthest throw of the day, to stretch her lead to an unassailable 150 points.

Lucy was not the only Central AC athlete in the event as Ciorstaidh Ainsworth of Wallace High School was attempting combined events for the first time. Ciorstaidh worked her way into 7th place after 1.27m at high jump and 6.49m at shot.

In the final 600m event it was Ciorstaidh who showed the form that won her the Scottish indoor 800m title as she won the race in 1:44.57 to pull her up to 6th place in the final standings. Lucy was not far behind finishing 4th with 1:49.33 to increase her margin of victory to 169 points.

This was not only Lucy’s first ever gold medal at a national level event , it also made her first girl from Dollar Academy ever to win a gold at these championships.

Like Tom, Lucy’s score was also the second highest ever in the history of the event and with better conditions she may have been able to score the extra 100 points required for the championship record.

Matt Chandler competing in the under 15 boys pentathlon was up against the hugely talented Joel MacFarlane of Arbroath who during the indoor season won the UK title in a new Scottish record. But Matt wasn’t going to give Joel an easy ride and pushed him hard setting superb personal bests at both 80m Hurdles (12.16s) and long jump (5.56m) to stay in touch. He then ran another pb 25.4s in the 200m and threw a pb 8.88m in the shot. He battled hard in the 800m but the wind took its toll and he finished with 2:28. Joel was too strong on this occasion but Matt scored an excellent 2511 points for a well deserved silver medal.

Balfron teammate Matthew Meredith was also taking part and finished in a respectable 8th place against a large field after some good all round performances.

Anna Cameron completed the medal haul for Balfron High and Central AC in the under 15 girls pentathlon in a close contest for the medals from start to finish. She started with a personal best 12.63s in the 75m Hurdles for 3rd place then set another personal best 1.43m in the high jump, one of the few athletes to pb in such difficult conditions.

Her shot of 6.94m saw her drop to 5th but an excellent long jump personal best of 4.90m, the furthest of the day, pulled her back into the medal positions.

Anna knew with a good 800m she could go even better and she ran a superbly paced race to pull clear and win in 2:31.66. As Anna pulled away from her rivals it was unclear if she had gained the required 7.5s margin over the 2nd placed athlete for silver. However when the results came out Anna had missed 2nd place by a single point but can still be proud of her bronze medal with an excellent score of 2685 points.

Lucy Davison of Morrison’s Academy was also competing in the event and took a creditable 5th place with 2409 points after a personal best 12.92s hurdles and an excellent 9.65m throw in the shot, the furthest of the day.

Charlie Dineen of Dollar Academy just missed out on the medals with 4th place. He opened with 9.91m in shot and then ran the second fastest 100m hurdles with 14.79s to place 2nd overall.

He completed his day with 5.82m at long jump, a pb 24.42s 200m and 5:16.72 at 1500m to score 2864.

As a reward for their performances Matt Chandler, Anna Cameron, Lucy Smith, Lucy Davison and Charlie Dineen were all selected for the Scottish Schools pentathlon squad. This squad will have special training sessions in the Autumn and from each age group 4 athletes will then be selected to represent Scotland in an international at the Emirates Arena in December.