Despite a disappointing opening day, Hampton schoolboy Ashley Bryant made a flying start to his 2009 decathlon programme with a lifetime best score at Street, Somerset, over the weekend.

Competing in unfavourable wet and windy conditions, teenager Bryant who goes to Halliford school, Shepperton, managed to add more than 100 points to his previous best score with a total of 6983 points, also posting a personal best of 4 minutes 48.19 seconds in the last of the 10 disciplines, the 1500m. His previous best was 4:49.4.

He was runner-up in the competition, 75 points behind fellow international Ben Gregory from Vale of Aylesbury.

Bryant was quite disappointed with his five efforts on the opening day - 100m in 11.47, long jump 6.75m, shot 12.48m, high jump 1.66m and 400m 50.91 - probably his worst start-ever to a competition.

Day two also started badly for Bryant as he ran the 100m hurdles in 15.38 into a headwind, threw the discus a reasonable 39.35m and pole vaulted 4m before he perked up with three lifetime best throws in the javelin where he ended with 67.16m, a significant improvement on his previous best of 59.29m at an open meeting at the beginning of last month.

This was the first time in two years that Bryant was able to throw from a full javelin run up after being restricted by a persistent back injury. His throw was just 53cm short of the best throw this season by a British junior athlete and not far off the European junior championships qualifying mark of 69m.

The European junior championships mark he is aiming for in the decathlon is 7175 points.