Britain grab Silver in The Team Relay Final at The World Pentathlon Championships
Great Britain’s women modern pentathletes ended their World Championships campaign on a high note by winning their third medal – a silver in the team relay competition.
Heather Fell, Katy Livingston and Mhairi Spence teamed up to finish second in the team relay in Budapest today (Monday).
Hungary Gold, Britain Silver and Poland Bronze photo http://ottusavb.hu/?q=gallery_new_eng
It rounded off an impressive World Championships for the British women at which Katy Livingston had already won an individual bronze medal and the trio of Heather Fell, Georgina Harland and Mhairi Spence won team silver.
The GB women topped the table after the shooting in today’s team relay, but were overtaken by Poland after the fencing. Host nation Hungary went to the top of the table after the swimming, with Great Britain remaining second and Poland dropping to third.
The positions were unaltered going into the final discipline, the run, with Hungary leading Great Britain by just 72 points. The Hungarians took gold by just 10 seconds, with Great Britain taking silver and Poland bronze.
“It was a successful day for us. We competed well, but congratulations to Hungary, they were just that little bit better than us today,” said Jan Bartu, Pentathlon GB performance director. “We now need to go away and refocus on the challenges ahead.”
Today’s performances also came as the International Modern Pentathlon Union (UIPM) confirmed that four British women – Katy Livingston, Heather Fell, Georgina Harland and Mhairi Spence – have achieved the Olympic qualifying standard for Beijing.
Livingston appears on the UIPM long list by virtue of performances at the 2007 European Championships and 2008 World Championships and Fell through her performance at last year’s European Championships. Spence and Harland feature on the UIPM long list through the Olympic ranking list.
However, each country can only take up to two qualifying athletes of each gender to the Games.
