London City Runner Met League race 3: Senior Men
This year's competition has become a story of remarkable dominance by our squad. Pre-race there was talk amongst the athletes of 'putting this title to bed before Christmas', and they were as good as their word. There was no slip in Ruislip! Our formidable A team inflicted a severe blow on our closest rivals, Serpentine, while the B team's status in Division 1 seems perfectly secure as they even eased above former rivals Shaftesbury 'A' in the league table. Our C team retain third place in the Division 3, but promotion is well outside our grasp now. While Hywel Care led the team home, it was probably Harold Wyber who earned the headlines.
The field was absolutely loaded, featuring 5 of the top 15 from last winter's South of England Champs (1, Hall, Herts Phoenix; 4, Smith, TVH; 6, Watts, Shaftesbury; 12, Strain, Highgate; and 15, Edwards, Shaftesbury). Aadan of TVH and Chesser of Newham, who won races 1 and 2 respectively, were also on the start line, along with 2.16 marathon man Ben Moreau of Aldershot, 3.42 1500m man Frank Baddick of Newham and the classy Dave Mitchinson, also of Newham. There was another extremely big field of 364 finishers.
The race was led out at a fierce pace around the small field by Glen Watts as many athletes strained to position themselves well before heading into the narrow wooded trails where it is notoriously difficult to overtake. For many, the race was won or lost within this first 2 minutes as some strained too hard and some not enough.
Of our men, Hywel Care, Bertie Powell and Matt Shone were way off the pace, while Darren Southcott and Liam Blaikie possibly ran too hard too soon. Though Care made a good impression on observers, made up ground well and finished 5" behind the 9th placed Smith, he was left very disappointed with his 12th. Powell rose from around 100th to 27th, thus improving on his 46th and 39th in races 1 and 2. Remarkably, this was his 41st consecutive Met League race, and 41st consecutive scoring 12 finish. Shone was handicapped by a hamstring niggle which prevented him from sprinting, so he was left at the start and unable to dart past men on the trails, and all he could manage was 49th.
Tom Phillips and Alex Cornwell were back from their respective universities and both ran well, for 18th and 23rd. In 17th place, Ben Hope is back up to 80 miles per week and may be a key player in the New Year. The twists, turns, ups and downs of the course are possibly not suited to Daniel Agustus' smooth style and he was a below-par 20th. Oli Heeks had had a vomiting virus as recently as Thursday but was determined to run. Then his spikes were left splayed by some of the stonier terrain, so his 26th place compared negatively with his 15th at Stevenage, but he was happy with his fitness.
Tom Beedell (40) and Omar Mansour (43) were both underwhelmed by their runs. Mansour's body language suggested that working late at night had taken its toll, while Beedell was unsure why he didn't perform. Angus Holford (47) threw in another scoring 12 performance, which is not to be sniffed at given our current quality. It suggests he will be ready once the longer, heavier races come along.
Two huge plusses were the 'returns' of Harold Wyber and Kevin Murphy. Since finishing 72nd in the 2008 South of England CC and winning a bronze team medal, Wyber had acquired a reputation as a good time charlie, an 'egg-on-legs', and associated with pie adverts. But, after a number of 'wake-up calls' and a recent lifestyle change, he is a shadow of his former self. Manager Terry McCarthy saw a good one coming, maybe a top 50. Instead, we got a thrilling 33rd, just 30" behind Cornwell, for example and 1 second behind Heathside's Brookes who won the Alexandra Palace Chingford League race. "It's like having a new signing," said McCarthy, "This new 'whippet Wyber' can now be a major player for us in the Southerns and Nationals!"
Former race winner and Essex champion Murphy had let things slip to 48 and then 82 in the first two league races. But a few training sessions and a 36th place later, he must now have the self-confidence to see that he still has plenty to offer the squad and the sport.
We closed 12 in 47, following 12 in 48 at Claybury and 46 at Stevenage - stunning consistency in a league of this quality. When 52 men had crossed the line, 6 were from Serpentine and 14 from Woodford. The team scores were WGEL 1168, Serpentine 1019, and the league totals are now WGEL 3561, Serpentine 3264 - a lead of 297. 3rd-placed Highgate are 1,000 points behind.
Serpentine's team manager Eric Phillips grimly studied his bloodied legs after falling and finishing 81st. Observers were tempted to conjure up metaphors about the Serpies' driving force being brought to his knees, but McCarthy was quick to nip such talk in the bud. "It's true, I certainly don't recall any club being so comfortably placed before Christmas," said McCarthy. "But we still need to go about things in a professional manner. However, if a couple of our young track men ask me if they can go and run indoors in January, I'll probably give them their pass-out. After all, I have men champing at the bit to make the scoring 12."
Track legend Shone kicked off our B team in 49th place, after overtaking Darren Southcott (52) in the last 300m. Southcott was disappointed with his race but he is working hard in training and will surely step up to the next level before too long. Having started in the 30s and dropped back to 79th, it would seem that Liam Blaikie overcooked it early on. But, in his first season in the senior ranks, it is an easy mistake to make and means he has plenty of room for improvement. His result was still perfectly decent, though not pleasing to him. He finished strongly, sprinting past several men including Jim Roche (83), who had had a good run.
Mat Clarkson (93) was making his debut for us. Having run 73.20 for half-marathon in early October, this triathlete took a break and is just now building up again. M40 Gareth Cavell (107) latched onto M50 Tony Pamphilon (106) early in the race and followed his every step through the race, saying that he had learned a good deal 'from the master' in the process. Pamphilon had finished 4th in the South of England M50 Championship the previous weekend but suffered a calf strain in the process, so this was a good, early return for him. These two finished 8" up on ironman triathlete Matt Molloy (111). Cavell raised his eyebrows, "For me, that's shattered Molloy's aura of invincibility," said the Romford-based black cabbie.
Rob Cox (125) felt he paid the price for recent missed training as he was passed on lap 2 by Pamphilon and Cavell plus several Serpentine men. He vowed to knuckle down prior to race 4. We had to wait almost 2 minutes for our next man, Jon Powell (188), who continues to tick over on very limited training. 25" further back came Rob Quantrell, whose 203 was slightly better than his Stevenage run. While son Angus closed the A team, dad M55 Alistair Holford closed the B team in 248, his best run of the season so far and never passed by a Woodford man.
Our B team finished 6th of 10 in Division 1, ahead of Serpentine B this time, and ahead of Shaftesbury A. It leaves us in a comfortable 6th place in the league, with it looking pretty certain that Met Police and Mornington Chasers are heading for the dreaded drop. Currently "Woodzilla", as we have been dubbed in some quarters, has the upper hand over "Serpiverse" in the battle of the behemoths.
There were some excellent hand-to-hand combat amongst our C teamers. A slightly ill M50 Alun Evans led a hungover M50 Paul Stockings most of the way until where it really mattered when Stockings took him, while Martin Mack closed them both down from behind. 265, 266 and 267, separated by 6 seconds. Andy Smith ran a strong second lap for 276, passing men all the way.
Michael Murphy and Steve Lambert were locked shoulder-to-shoulder for the first four miles. At one point, in fact, things looked so pally that an over-hyped manager McCarthy, like a sweaty punter at a dog fight, exhorted the duo to "hurt each other !!" At this point "the thespian they call Lambo" realised that this was no rehearsal. He required no more prompting and did not fluff his lines, throwing in a cruel 6.40 mile to dislodge the limpet-like 'Cool-Hand' Murphy by a tidy 14", 284 to 287.
Kiwi Tim Hawkes was another making his debut for us, a 1.48 man of the 400/800 type who has not trained for a long while and now just starting on a 12-week crash program for the Marseilles Marathon. His was a measured run: even finishing 301 he showed unmistakeable culture. Showing good improvement on his Stevenage position, M40 Richard Hogg (305) was only passed by Hawkes in the final stages. In 317, M50 Tom Spanyol was one of many fallers, but there was a time when this ex-punk rocker would receive far worse knocks from teddy boys, and there was no complaint.
The much-awaited showdown between M55 Stuart Phillips and a renascent M60 Trevor Powell had the connoisseurs drooling. No quarter was asked for or offered as the two men tore into one another at a rate of knots. In so doing they both achieved very good results, with the bookies' favourite Phillips coming out on top, 332 to 344 with a margin of 1min 18secs. The gap from these two to the race back marker grows ever more marked.
The C team were 7th on the day and remain in 3rd place in Division 3.Overall, another great day for the squad and we can look forward to the January fixtures - Essex Champs, Met League race 4, Southern champs - full of confidence and enthusiasm.