TEESSIDE Tornado Richard Kilty became the fastest UK junior of the new outdoor season when he broke the 100m under-20 record in the North-East championships at Gateshead Stadium.
Challenged on his outside by training partner Yusuf Aliu, the 17-year-old Gateshead Harrier defied the cold and wet conditions to break the tape in 10.79 secs - twenty-five hundredths of a second quicker than the time fellow Teessider Peter Vickers set in 2003.
The superb performance lifted Kilty - a student at Stockton Sixth Form College - above Derby's 19-year-old Ben Stramkowski, who beat him in the opening British Athletics League Division 2 match at Chelmsford on May 5 in a time of 10.85 secs.
Kilty, a first year junior, was only one hundredth of a second away from his personal-best time, set at Grangemouth in July last year, just after he won the English Schools intermediate boys 100m title at Gateshead, beating Aliu into second place.
Aliu's time of 10.88 took him to third place in this year's UK outdoor rankings, an improvement of nine places.
Kilty went on to win the 200m, but with only one other junior in the race was never challenged and looked to be easing up as he won in 21.94 secs, just over half a second outside the record set by Mandale's John Stewart in 1998.
Another Stockton-based athlete, Sudanese Rabah Yusuf, set a new senior men's 200m record with a sizzling run.
The 20-year-old, who beat Olympian Jared Deacon in the 2004 championships over 400m, clocked 21.11 secs to slice eight hundredths off the record set by the European and Commonwealth Games relay gold medallist's brother Dave in 1994.
Yusuf, who now competes in the British Athletics League Premiership for London club Newham and Essex Beagles, is currently seeking British citizenship.
Shildon AC's Kate Avery sliced an astonishing 12 seconds off the six year old under-17 women's 3000m record with a superb gun-to-tape victory in a time of 10 mins 2.1 secs, lifting her to fourth in the UK rankings.
The English Schools 1500m silver-medallist and former National, Northern and North-East cross country champion, devastated the opposition and at the finish had a 250m lead on 2006 winner Helen Girtig, who was out-sprinted for the silver medal by Morpeth's Natalie Young.
Avery, still only 15 and a first-year under-17, last raced over 3000m in April 2005, when she clocked 10:35.2.
Gateshead Harrier Niall Flannery knocked nearly two seconds off the under-17 400m hurdles record with a time of 53.88 secs and went on to win the 1500m steeplechase in 5 mins 10.8 secs.
Wearsider Mark Christie (Sale) added 15 cms to his own championship record when he cleared 1.15m as the senior men's pole vault was moved indoors because of heavy rain.
Gateshead's Sally Scott also improved the under-17 women's record with a height of 3.17m, while Middlesbrough's Rachel Fairless raised the senior mark to 3.10m.
South Shields based hospital physiotherapist Sara Todd, competing for Broder Harriers, won three gold medals - the 100m hurdles (14.44 secs), the 400m hurdles (61.7 secs) and the 200m (25.4 secs) - before adding a silver in the 100m (12.48 secs) behind Rugby and Northampton's Victoria Barr (12.20 secs).
The New Marske Harriers trio of Jim Conaghan, Mike Harper and Stuart Edwards won the British Masters over-70 Road Relay Championship at Sutton Park, Birmingham.
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