CC: Inter-Counties / World Trial 2010
Update: on Tuesday Ronnie Sparke was selected to represent GB U20s (as he was in 2009) at the World CC Championships in Poland on 28th March.
Seven of our young athletes were selected to run for Essex at Saturday’s Inter County Championships, held this year at Cofton Park in Birmingham. Generally considered to be the premier competition on the cross country season, the standard of the racing lived up to expectations with some large fields and fast times over a surface that was suited to aggressive front running. And 6 Woodford athletes represented their counties in the senior men's race, while Jess Sparke was our sole representative in the women's race.
The day’s best YA result from a Woodford perspective was Ronnie Sparke’s 5th place in the U20 Men’s race.
This race was won by Middlesex’s Richard Goodman; still an U17, he was looking for World Championship selection and with the places as yet uncertain, Ronnie will be kept on tenterhooks after being run down in the home straight and caught on the line by Surrey’s Jonny Hay. Alex Cornwell (94th) also ran in this event but was not happy with his race; but the Essex team finished 2nd.In the U15 Boys event, James Stockings came 52nd but this was probably a better result than he gives himself credit for, finishing as second Essex scorer and 57 seconds down on the winner. Becky Hewitt, 48th in the U20W race, professed herself to be reasonably content with her run in yet another race where an U17 (Amelia Gorecka) stepped up an age group to win.
Sidnie Sales (81st) and Claudia Conway (166th) were the 4th and 8th Essex scorers respectively in the U17W’s event. Claudia expressed relief after finishing following experiencing sore quads during the week and being unable to train properly. Amelia Barrett’s run in the U13 Girls race exemplified the standard of the competition; she finished 126th of the 305 runners, barely more than a minute down on the winner but still the 8th Essex counter. Nonetheless, being part of a winning Essex team and finishing comfortably inside the top half of the field in her first Inter Counties is a fine achievement and one she will hope to build on next year.
Jess Sparke was reasonably happy with her 8th place in the women's race, despite it meaning that she will not be selected for the World CC Championships. Her confidence took a big blow after finishing 7th in the National, and she went into this race with some trepidation. Under those circumstances, she was relieved to get around in a respectable position. There was further consolation in a prize of £2,000 as overall winner of the McCain UK Cross Challenge series, by just 1 point from Laura Kenney, who in turn beat Hatti Dean by just 1 point.
The men's race saw a return to good results for Hywel Care (Merseyside), our leading man in 40th position. His run will hopefully have earned him a spot on the Wales team for the Home Countries international at Mansfield in a fortnight's time. 22" behind Care in 54th was Martyn Cryer, who won a gold medal as 5th scorer in the victorious Lancashire team. 16" further back in a pleasing 62nd was Matt Barnes-Smith (Suffolk).
Of our Essex men, Lotfi Chebli started very assertively but was forced to abandon when calf trouble crept up. Angus Holford was 3rd Essex scorer with a very sound run in 157th, while Craig Berg was disappointed to trickle backwards into 186th place, nonetheless 5th Essex scorer.