NATASHA Smith finished her school athletics career on a winning high.

Smith,18, came out on top at the English Schools senior heptathlon at Bedford Athletics Stadium.

She became first athlete from Gloucestershire to win the combined events title, male or female in any of the three age groups,

"I'm really pleased to finish my last ever schools competition on a high," said Smith. "My season has been up and down, as combined events usually are, so I was happy to produce a solid performance overall, resulting in a personal best points score."

Representing Gloucestershire, Smith, who has just completed seven years at Stroud High School, started the two-day event with the 100m hurdles, recording a time of 14.85 seconds to begin the day in fourth place. She then moved up one position after a high jump of 1.71m, her best height in a combined event this year. A personal best shot put of 10.37m enabled her to secure second position going into the final event of the first day, the 200m, which she ran in 26.01 seconds to end day one in second place.

Sunday’s first event was a long-jump, where Smith's best recorded jump of 5.54m was close to her personal best. This was followed by a javelin throw of 35.17m, enabling her to move into first place. Before the final event of 800m, she therefore knew that to win the championship she had to stay ahead of her two closest rivals. She retained the lead with a time of two minutes 24.96 seconds.

At the end of the seven events over the weekend, Smith had accumulated a total of 5,123 points, a new personal best overall points score, finishing 48 points ahead of the second-place competitor.

Her coach, Kerry Eddie-Jury, a former Commonwealth Games heptathlete, who has been coaching Smith for nearly three years, said: "It was a great way for Natasha to end her six years of competition at English Schools athletics events and achieve her first-ever win. Natasha hopes to continue to improve at Loughborough University, where she will be starting a degree in sport and exercise science."