Dedicated Megan has golden day at Blenheim Palace

The 14-year-old North Leamington School pupil won the girls’ British Youth Championship at Blenheim Palace this month.

This result marks superb progress for the youngster, who took silvers in both the British Duathlon and Aquathlon Championships earlier this season and also won her category of the West Midlands Cross Country League.

“It feels brilliant,” said Megan.

“The medal is in my room next to my two silvers and I keep looking at it to remind myself I won.”

In blustery conditions at Blenheim, Megan exited the water from the 400m swim in fifth place and negotiated a 400m run before completing a slick transition on to the bicycle.

Passing through the picturesque palace gates, she moved quickly up from third to first place and began to build a lone break away over the 13.2k leg.

By the second lap Megan had opened up a one-minute lead from a chasing pack of six riders and she held this to enter the second transition with a lead of one minute and five seconds.

“I went into the race thinking I needed to get away on the bike because I knew I had very strong runners behind me,” said Megan.

Megan completed another faultless transition on to the 3k run but she was aware the chasing pack included national runners Bronwen Owen and her team mate Sian Rainsley.

Owen showed the strongest pace but Megan summoned up one of her best runs of the year to finish in 45min 39sec - six seconds ahead of Owen and 12 seconds ahead of Rainsley.

Megan said: “I felt brilliant on the bike but the run was really hilly so I just tried to hold it at my own pace and it worked.

“I was struggling towards the end of the race as I had lost all of my energy but I didn’t think about the runners behind me because I knew there was a gap.

“Luckily the boys had gone off first and keeping up with their trailing runners kept me concentrated.”

After the race Megan met Elite Womens’ winner Jodie Stimpson and world numbers one and two Alistair and Jonny Brownlee, who took joint gold in the men’s Elite race.

The brothers are expected to be medallists at the forthcoming Olympic Games and are among Megan’s sporting idols, who also include Tour De France and Olympic cyclists Mark Cavendish and Bradley Wiggins.

Megan said: “I would love to compete in the Olympics one day.

“I’ve been invited to train with the Olympic Youth Triathlon Academy and I also train with the West Midlands Academy once a month.”

Megan has thanked Leamington Swimming Club coach Graham Nash for helping to improve her technique in the water this season.

She has also praised her running coach Jim Rothman of Leamington C&AC and her parents Ian and Angela for their continued support and for ‘taxiing’ her around.

“I couldn’t have done it without them,” she said.