Multi-event specialist Evie Hancox is looking for her performances this year to be a launchpad for greater things in 2014.
The 15-year-old King’s School pupil, from Poynton, claimed a silver medal in the Cheshire Schools’ under-16s Pentathlon Championships.
She now hopes it can lead her to bigger things in the English Schools’ Championships next year.
Inspired by Britain’s heptathletes, she took up the shortened form of that event to develop her all-round athletic skills.
Strong in the long and high jump, 80 metre hurdles and 800 metres, she knows she is let down a little by her shot put.
She said: “I was hoping to do 8m but could only manage 6.30m.
“However, it was good experience because, as Jessica Ennis and Katarina Johnson-Thompson are forever saying, as a multi-event athlete, you have to stay positive and be able to bounce back from a bad performance, because in another hour you will have to go again.”
Evie trains with DASH athletics in Stockport four times a week after school – as well as at weekends – and says the winter regime is much tougher.
“There will be some very hard out-of-season work now, with a lot of pyramid training, running sets of 100m, 200m and 300m,” she said.
“It’s hard work, but if I can get to the English Schools’ Championships next summer it will be all worthwhile.”
King’s Girls’ Division Principal, Jo Anderson, said: “Evie is a dedicated young athlete with fabulous all-round skills and a hugely positive approach.
“I am sure Jessica Ennis and Katarina Johnson-Thompson would be proud to know they have been such an inspiration to her.”
