James Hammond narrowly misses out on EYOC Long title to claim Silver

Long Distance

Szczecin, Poland was the location for EYOC 2024, and Saturday’s long-distance event tested the athletes’ physical abilities in the hilly terrain, where they also had to show their skills in coping with route planning on at least one long leg.

However, the Great Britain team had some fantastic results across the board, the notable headline was James Hammond taking silver in the M18 class, narrowly missing out on gold by six seconds to Norway’s Emil Husebye Aamodt, with the two completely equal at the intermediate split time just before 7km! They were joined on the podium by Jonas Fenne Ingierd also from Norway.

There were some great results in the M16 class with three of the team all inside the top 20, and Finn Selmer Duguid finishing in 6^th position, Finlay McLuckie 14^th, Marcus Perry 18th and Scarlett Kelly also finishing inside the top 20 in W16.

Long Distance Results

Images below: James on the podium, the EYOC 2024 GB Team, James leaps across the finish line; a shot of the Great Britain team for EYOC 2024 all together. Credits: Jakub Kijak MoonLine Media and Judy Bell.

Images above: Emily Atkinson and Dan Heppell. Jakub Kijak MoonLine Media.

Sprint 

Sunday’s Sprint was held in central Szczecin, as more than 400 athletes took part in the event on exclusively urban terrain.

There were lots of emotions from the GB team and the bar was set high after Saturdays success but the team’s resilience and determination shone through.

It was a tough course with some tricky route choices, barriers and dead ends. This caught lots out with many of the M16s mis-punching. However, there was still some fantastic racing with Laurence Ward 18^th, Tommy Rollins 19^th and Emily Atkinson 21^st.

Sprint Results

Images below: Heather High and Finlay McLuckie, then Finn Selmer Duguid and Freya Tryner. Image credits: Tomasz Krysiak, Judy Bell and David Peel.

Relay

The relays took place on the final day of the competition, where over 400 athletes were back in the forest to be met with varied terrain, a number of hills, and richly forked courses. This was met with mixed reactions from the athletes about the course they faced.

The W16 team of Ella Baxter, Emily Atkinson and Scarlett Kelly were the highest placed team in 8^th. The M16 team in 13^th, and he Mens and Womens 18 teams in 15^th and 18 respectively.

Relay results

Images below: W16 team - Ella Baxter/ Katie Buckley/ Scarlett Kelly/ Emily Atkinson and M16 team - Oscar Peel/ Finn Selmer Duguid/ Marcus Perry/ Finlay McLuckie. M18 team - James Hammond/ Laurence Ward/ Tommy Rollins/ Daniel Heppell and W18 team - Freya Tryner/ Heather High/ Ruth Gooch/ Jocie Hilton. Credited to Judy Bell.

The team had a great experience at the competition and thank you to the Team Managers Judy Bell, Pete Tryner, Phil Volkes and Rona Lindsay who took the time to support the team and ensure they were able to race to their best ability.

Some of the team will now travel to Czechia for the Junior World Championships which take place from the 1^st -7^th July and we wish them all the best of luck!