Kemnay athlete Alix Still believes she can be a record-breaker this winter despite suffering from a Covid setback.
The 21-year-old Aberdeenshire multi-event specialist, who is based at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, has her sights set on representing Scotland in the heptathlon at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games later this year.
But firstly she is keen to take the Scottish indoor pentathlon record of 4,096 points set by Anglo Scot Aileen Wilson in 2002.
Her current best is 3,974, which she achieved in last year’s Atlantic Conference Championships. This gives her second position on the Scottish all-time best performers list.
Still opened her 2022 account by scoring 3,849 in the Hokie Invitational at Blacksburg, Virginia. Although short of her best, it compares favourably with the 3,781 she racked up at the same meeting 12 months earlier.
She said: “Overall I can’t really complain about the final score in the Hokie. When I was back home in December, I got Covid. I was pretty ill and wasn’t able to make it back to America when I was supposed to.
“This hindered my training and I was unable to really do much for a couple weeks.
“So, with all that going on, I was very happy that my score was higher than last year after being behind on training.
“There’s still a lot of work to do, especially in my jumps, both high and long, but I have finally been able to have some consistent training so I am looking forward to the rest of the season.”
Still was particularly happy with her performance in the shot, in which she threw a personal best 11.01m. She subsequently set an indoor PB in the long jump, with 5.86m, and a season’s best in the high jump, 1.66, at the Doc Hale invitational meeting to lessen her earlier concerns.
She said: “My next pentathlon will be the Atlantic Conference Championships and there are some good girls coming in this year.
“So, if I want to make it to the National Collegiate Championships, I will have to put up a good score – which I know I am capable of.”
And what about the Scottish record?
“That’s still very much in my thoughts and I’m excited to try getting it,” Still said.
But it’s the outdoor heptathlon which is to be Still’s biggest focus for 2022, with a Commonwealth Games place remaining high on her list of priorities.
Her best heptathlon score of 5,371, set in April, isn’t too far off the standard required by Scotland’s selectors to be considered for the Commonwealth Games.
Still returns to action this weekend when she heads for a meet at Clemson, South Carolina.
She said: “I am currently entered in the hurdles, long jump and high jump so this will be another good opportunity for some good scores.”
Struan Linton now third on Aberdeen AAC indoor 60m all-time list
Aberdeen AAC’s Struan Linton is edging closer to the north-east club’s senior men’s indoor 60m record after producing another lifetime best performance.
The 20-year-old North East of Scotland College student clocked 6.95secs when taking second place in a classy sprint race at the latest Aberdeen Sports Village indoor open graded meeting.
The only men ahead of him on the Aberdeen all-time best performers list now are Stephen Dunlop, who set the current record of 6.89 eight years ago, and Desmond Ojei, who clocked 6.91 in 2017.
Ironically, it was Scotland international Dunlop, now competing for Kilbarchan AAC, who got the better of Linton in the Aberdeen race.
He won in a personal best 6.86 to move into fourth position in this year’s national rankings, while Linton now sits in sixth spot.
Linton said: “It was good to get out there again and show what I can do.
“Stephen is a good pal of mine and it was great having someone with his experience coming up here for me to compete against. He was also very pleased to have achieved a personal best time.”
Linton is contemplating an appearance in the British Universities and Colleges indoor championships at Sheffeld later in the month, where he’ll have the opportunity to improve his time against top-class opposition.
He said:” I’d like to compete there, but I’m in the process of trying to sort out an entry.
“If it doesn’t come off then there’s one more Aberdeen open meeting, on March 6.
“On the other hand, it wouldn’t be a problem if I ended the season now. as I have the summer outdoors to look forward to.”
Run Balmoral set for bumper turnout
The 2022 Run Balmoral festival of running, scheduled for the weekend of April 23-24, is set to attract a bumper turnout of competitors with some of the races on the two-day programme having already sold out.
The Deeside event, which has been cancelled for the past two years because of the pandemic, usually attracts more than 5,000 runners of all ages – and that figure is on course to be matched.
All 700 places in the Bristow 15-mile trail race were taken up before the end of January, the first time this has happened.
Only a handful of the 1,000 available places in the Harbour Energy 5k remain, while the Stena Drilling 10k is well on the way to filling its 2,450 slots. It’s a similar story with the Apollo duathlon and the Bristow three-mile trail race.
And the quota of 130 slots in the Devil of Deeside Challenge has been fully subscribed. This is the most demanding event of the weekend with competitors tackling the 5k and 10k on the Saturday, followed by the duathlon and 15-mile trail race on the Sunday.
There is, however, still a healthy capacity in the MPH primary schools 1.5k and the Aon secondary schools 2.5k, but organisers expect that situation to change over the next few weeks.
The absolute closing date for entries is March 31, but earlier if a race fills up.