National CC Relays
Our women's team finished a fine 14th in the National Cross Country Relays at Mansfield today. Our U20 Men's team was an excellent 9th, and a men's team finished 34th.
Georgie-Lou Sales was the fastest of our 3 women, Alex Cornwell was fastest man, and Ed Shepherd fastest U20.
This was the first time our women had appeared at this event since winning the bronze medals (L Snow, J Sparke, K Sparke) in 2009, and 14th was a very worthy performance.
Following her impressive 61.35 in the Great South Run 10 mile race last Sunday, U20 Sidnie Sales led off with 11.02 on Leg 1, which earned her 32nd place. Emily Moss, who was forced to pull out of the Met League race at Claybury a fortnight ago after twisting her ankle, ran a good 11.05 to leave the team in 19th. And Georgie-Lou Sales continued her comeback by gaining another 5 places, and turned the tables on her sister by running 5 seconds quicker, 10.57. Fastest woman of the day was Hannah Walker of Birchfield with 9.46. 157 men's teams (including B, C etc) closed. [Linked photos courtesy of Adi Royle]
With many of the squad preferring not to travel north for 15 minutes of running at a time of year when big-volume training is the norm, our men's team consisted of 4 guys who found it suited their purposes to race. Matt Gunby had had a heavy training week, which explained what he termed a "terrible" run of 15.59 which left us in 14th on leg 1. Alex Cornwell, on the other hand, had a stormer and clocked 15.46 to hoist us into 9th. Darren Southcott felt he paced his run badly, dragged along by some of the quick men who were passing him. He timed 17.32 and dropped down to 24th. And new recruit Rob Wilbraham, whose family home is near the venue, stepped in to get the team around running 18.58, which he was somewhat disappointed with. Fastest man of the day was Stockport's Steve Vernon with 15.17. 102 women's teams closed.
The U20 Men's race was of a very high standard, and our team's time would have earned 6th place last year while this year they were 11th of the 58 teams that finished. On Leg 1, James Stockings had his foot clipped after 2 minutes' running, ran with his shoe half-off for 5 minutes, and then kicked it off completely for the last 1K. He clocked 9.22 for 18th. Liam Blaikie ran a sound 9.32 and brought the team up to 12th. And Ed Shepherd picked up one more place as he ran 9.09 on the final leg. Fastest of the day wwith 8.48 was Richard Horton of Shaftesbury.