Masterful Slaughter claims another title

His latest success - the Outdoor Pentathlon - consisted of the long jump, javelin, 200m, discus and 1,500m.

The Bexhill-based athlete rose to the occasion just three weeks after peaking for the World Championships.

A safe first effort in the opening long jump looked good enough to give Slaughter the perfect start but his great rival John Mayor (Stevenage), whom Slaughter beat into fourth at the World Championships, bettered it by a single centimetre with the very last jump of the competition.

A below par performance followed in the javelin but it was still the second furthest throw of the day. Next up was the 200m and running in lane two, Mayor enjoyed a favourable draw with Slaughter blinded out in lane six. This enabled Mayor to fly out of the blocks and effectively have the race sewn up before his rival could respond. Mayor finished in a personal best of 24.8 to Slaughter's season's best of 25.2, both scoring over 800 points.

The discus was where the tables were turned with Slaughter's season's best of 34.20m scoring over 200 more points than Mayor to effectively wrap up the title.

Slaughter decided to pick up the pace in the second half of the concluding 1,500m, pulling away from the field with a 72-second last lap to win in 4.47.2 and amass a points score of 3,471 - over 300 points ahead of Mayor's total.