Fechin McCormick
LUCY ARMITAGE just keeps rolling out PB’s! In an electrifying evening of athletics at August’s Longford Park BMC Grand Prix, Sale Harrier’s rising middle distance star recorded her 5th personal best over 800m this season storming to victory in the ‘A’ race with a breath-taking 2:00.96. “I’m in shock to be honest. At 200m to go, I realised I still had something left… so I decided to kick.”
This wasn’t just another PB — it was her latest chapter in an amazing summer of PB’s. Lucy began 2025 holding an 800m best of 2:07.12. Then came her cascade…….:
At May’s Loughborough International, she reduced her 800m to 2:05.86. Two weeks later, at the club’s NAL match in York, she improved further to 2:04.96. A week later at Birmingham University’s BMC Grand Prix, she reduced it yet again to 2:03.10. Then at the FISU World University Games in July, she recorded 2:03.02 in the semi-final.
Her seismic leap to 2:00.96 – a monumental three seconds faster than her previous PB, ranks her 3rd in the UK U23 rankings this year and 19th fastest U23 ever in the UK – and so tantalising close to the sub-2 minutes barrier, one cannot help but wonder if she might be in the line-up for the 2026 Glasgow Commonwealth Games.
