BARROWFORD’S Leah Hillman has become the first U13 girl in the country to throw the javelin further than 30 metres this year.

The 12-year old Pendle Athletic Club athlete hit the top of the ‘Power of 10’ National Rankings list with an effort of 31.94 metres at the Southport Waterloo Open at Litherland a fortnight ago.

It is more than 2.5 metres clear of her closest rival and improves her own Pendle Club Record by more than three metres. At her age she is not yet specialising in one discipline and she is displaying a rare talent for all the throwing events.

Last week she won three gold medals at the Mid Lancs Medal Meeting at Wigan and after another marvellous day on Sunday she rates in the UK top five in the javelin, shot and discus and holds all three Pendle Club Records.

A couple of days after the Wigan fixture Hillman raised her personal best in the shot to 9.21m at the Trafford Medal Meeting, but that performance proved to be a mere prelude, because in last Sunday’s Pendle Open Medal Meeting she became the first U13 girl from Pendle to smash through the 10 metre barrier, throwing 10.08m The Park High School student is only the fourth girl in the country to reach the distance in 2011 and she has erased Kate Franzke’s 9.75m after 13 years as the Pendle club record.

At Sunday’s meeting at Seedhill, she landed three gold medals in the U13 age group, also taking the javelin (29.58m) and discus (24.82m) honours.

Hillman has only been with Pendle Athletic Club for two years, but has made dramatic progress while training three times a week under her coach Derek Butterworth.

In the discus for example, she has risen from 163rd to fifth in the UK rankings this season with a personal best 26.24m set at Stretford in April. n Last Sunday’s Pendle Open Meeting was the last track and field competition in East Lancashire this summer although there will be several more in the north west throughout September – notably two at Blackpool.

Throughout the season our local clubs have been taking part in four rounds of the Northern Young Athletes League, which caters for U13s, U15s and U17s. Blackburn Harriers are our highest ranked club and have finished fifth of nine clubs in the Premier West Division.

Taking on each of their rivals two at a time, they had two second and two third places. Pendle Athletic Club ended bottom of Division 1 North West after four third places.

The format is different in the second division where all eight clubs compete head to head in each fixture.

In Division 2 WC Hyndburn were third with one victory backed by a second place and two thirds. Taking part in the same matches, Ribble Valley AC took fifth after one third, two fifths and a sixth.

Blackburn Harriers are alone among our locals in contesting the National Junior League, which is solely for athletes in the U20 age band. The club is in the seven-strong Mersey League, and finished second to Liverpool Harriers having three times finished second and once taken third.

As the runners-up they were invited to contest the promotion match for a place in the Northern Premier League but have declined because of the distances involved in travelling to venues like Glasgow, Edinburgh and Gateshead.