The future stars of Peruvian athletics gathered, for three days, at the Athletics Stadium of the National Sports Village (VIDENA). Many of the young athletes experienced their first competition in a world class stage, which was built to host the Lima 2019 Pan American and Parapan American Games.

The modern Athletics Stadium, which has an alternate warm-up stage, reopened its doors after hosting—only a few days ago—the National School Sports Games, and after having been the venue for the Lima 2019 athletics championship.

This time, the U-18 National Championship was contested and Liga de Barranco was crowned champion after scoring 164 points in the men’s category and 118 points in women’s category, for a total of 282 points.

Verónica Huacasi (Platería, Puno) and Guido Bustamante (Puno) achieved two of the best technical marks during this competition. Huacasi reached the mark in the 2000 m steeplechase and Bustamante did it in the 3000 m race.

Huacasi’s time was 7m 14s 56c, winning her the gold and the top technical mark, as well as adding 892 IAAF points. On the other hand, Bustamante finished his race with a time of 8m 30s 86c in the 3000 m event. With this mark, Bustamante beat the national U-18 record set in 2004 by Mario Bazán, with 8m 33s 06c in Guyana.

The U-18 National Championship gathered athletes from Lima and across the country, in addition to Bustamante and Huacasi, including Gabriel Cubas, Lucero Choca and Anthony Farfán.

The National Championship for children is set to take place early November, for the U-12, U-14 and U-16 categories, in the same Athletics Stadium, which has become a great legacy for sports practice in Peru.