Teenage athlete wins gold at national competition

A TEENAGE athlete from Wargrave won gold at a national heptathlon competition, despite his training being interrupted by illness and injury.

Sammy Ball, 18, beat 17 other finishers at the England Athletics national indoor under-20 combined events championships in Sheffield over the weekend of January 7 and 8.

He competed in seven events comprising 60m dash, long jump, shot put, high jump, hurdles, pole vault and the 1,000m.

He gained a total of 5,434 points, which was more than 600 points ahead of his nearest rival.

Sammy, who was competing for Reading Athletic Club, said: “I was very happy with it. I was aiming to win but for my personal scores I didn’t have super-high expectations.

“I got a personal best in the pole vault, one of the only events I’d done some technical work in. It’s one of my weaker events so I was very pleased to get the result.

“I’ll have a couple of days off and then get back to training.”

Sammy set the English record for the event last year but then suffered a hamstring injury at the world under-20 championships in Colombia in August.

That, plus a recent chesty cough, meant that he had been forced to focus on rehabilitation rather than training in the run-up to the national competition. He said: “I was doing hurdles at the world champs and I felt my hamstring a little bit. It’s a lot better now, but I still can’t hurdle 100 per cent. I can’t run flat out.

“I’m doing a lot of strengthening exercise around the leg muscles and core exercises. There are a lot of hamstring exercises so that one isn’t more dominant than the other.”

Sammy, who lives in Victoria Road with his mother, Sarah, and father, Lincoln, attended the Piggott School and is now studying sport science at the Berkshire College of Agriculture in Maidenhead. He started athletics when he was nine.

He said: “I took it more seriously when I turned 14. I was put in a multi-event group straight away and realised I was quite good at it.

“My favourite events are the shot put and discus. I enjoy the pole vault but it can go wrong. I enjoy the safer events.

“I only go to college three days a week, so the other days I can spend training. I train six days a week, about 22 hours in total. It is a lot but I enjoy it.”

Last year, he won the national title for under-20s in the decathlon.

His next event is the England Athletics decathlon championships in May, in which he hopes to qualify for the European championships to be held in Jerusalem in August.

Sammy said: “I’d like to see how far I can get. As of now, I’m trying to get some part-time work and do my training alongside.”

His father said: “He’s a great athlete with lots of prospects.”