Georgia Hannam, Kerenza Bryson and Olivia Green claimed Pentathlon GB’s 4th medal of the 2019 Junior European Championships as they secured team bronze in the women’s final.
Fine individual displays saw all three British athletes finish inside the top 20 in Poland with Hannam 11th, Bryson 15th and Green 18th. Those scores added together saw the trio claim the final spot on the team podium on a day which showed plenty of promise and also things to work on for the British youngsters.
Story of the Day
The women’s final began yesterday with the fencing ranking round. It was Lancashire’s Hannam who started the strongest with 21 victories and just 14 defeats from her 35 bouts. That was one more victory than Plymouth’s Bryson with Saddleworth’s Green ending the opening discipline with 15 hits.
The second day started with the swim and the British trio all began strongly. It was once again University of Bath based Hannam who led the way, stopping the clock in 2:16.99, the seventh quickest time of the final. Green (2:20.06) and Bryson (2:23.07) also began the day in fine form as they improved on their qualifying times by around three seconds.
The fencing bonus round saw all three Pentathlon GB athletes pick up additional points, Bryson claiming two extra victories with Hannam and Green winning one apiece. That meant Hannam was the leading Brit in 7th with Bryson 11th and Green 23rd after the opening two disciplines in Drzonkow.
The riding arena has been Hannam’s achilles heel over the past couple of seasons, but the 21-year-old performed when it mattered most. A calm and composed display saw the Brit perform a clean round with just 5 time penalties to her name, a score of 295 points. Green rolled two poles to score 286 with Bryson collecting 254 points after a refusal and couple of knockdowns on her allocated horse Wulkan, a score that was still significantly better than the Ukranian athlete who had been on the same horse in the first round.
That saw TASS supported athlete Hannam move up to 3rd in the overall standings with Green 17thand Bryson 20th heading into the laser run. However, with the majority of the field separated by just small margins, there was still plenty of room for changes.
A battling display from Hannam saw her agonisingly miss out on a top 10 finish, however 11th still marked her best ever international result at junior level. Some sharp shooting from Bryson saw her make significant ground in the laser run to come home 15th with Green ending her first major championship at junior level in 18th. The performances also saw the British trio claim team bronze, the second medal of the week for all three athletes after Green and Bryson’s women’s relay silver on Tuesday and Hannam’s mixed relay bronze alongside Oliver Murray on Monday.
Tomorrow sees the men’s final taking place in Drzonkow with Myles Pillage, Oliver Murray and William Howard all in action for Pentathlon GB. Their fencing ranking round took place today with Plymouth’s Pillage leading the Brits on 20 victories, one ahead of Murray with junior international debutant Howard ending with 13 hits.
Courtesy of Pentathlon GB
