CANON Slade athletes have reached the finals of the National Schools Championships.

The year nine and year 10 girls will compete against the other 11 best schools in the country at Oxford in a fortnight.

And they may be joined by their year seven and year eight team which is waiting to learn if they have made it to the final of the English Schools Athletics Association Track and Field Schools Cup at Tilsley Park, Abingdon.

The older team, the intermediate girls, reached the final last year and earned their place at this years final by winning the preliminary round at Oldham and then winning the North West A Final at Trafford.

The junior girls made a big improvement after finishing fifth in the preliminary round and then going on to come second in the regional final.

The winners of the regional finals go through to the national final automatically while the teams which finished second in the regional finals, like Canon Slades juniors, must wait to learn if they performed well enough to earn one of the remaining five final places.