A STUNNING performance at the East Anglia Schools Combined Events Championships has propelled Witham's Jessica Hopkins into the top four in the UK's under-15 pentathlon rankings.

The 14-year-old Maltings Academy pupil secured 3,203 points from her five events at the championships in Peterborough to take second place on the day with a new personal best and also qualify for a place at the national finals in Exeter in September.

Hopkins was flying the flag for Essex at the regional event and consistently excelled throughout the day.

She said: "It was so much fun to compete for the whole day with my friends and celebrate the victory with them.

"I'm very excited for the (national) finals and to hopefully get some more personal bests.

"I've qualified for the finals in Exeter in September along with three other girls that competed for Essex and if our team get the most combined points, we then go Glasgow to compete for England."

The first event was the 75 metre hurdles, where she came third out of all the heats with a time of 12.0 seconds.

Next up was the shot putt, when a throw of 11.18m put the Maltings star in first place overall and she then backed that up by securing a new personal best (PB) of 1.66m in the high jump to maintain her place at the top of the standings.

Hopkins, who competes for Chelmsford Athletics Club, added: "The crowd were amazing; they were all clapping in time to my run up which made it even more exciting."

A long jump of 5.15m kept her top and set up a great finale in the last event - the 800m - when a time of two minutes 45 seconds saw Hopkins finish second overall.

Her score of 3,203 points was only 62 away from first place and has placed her fourth in the country for under-15 girls' pentathlon.

Her strong form continued as Hopkins then returned to club duties for Chelmsford in the Eastern Young Athletes League at Luton.

She managed to get a new PB of 12.84m in the shot putt, a high jump PB of 1.67m and came second in the 300m.

The youngster is due to be back in action this weekend when she will head to Gateshead on Saturday for the English Schools Championships where she will be competing in the shot putt.