The South of England Cross Country Championships took place on 30 January at Parliament Hill, London. The wet weather turned this undulating course a bowl of mud, clay and leaf mold which made running spikes very heavy in a short space of time. This was extremely challenging for everyone competing, especially the senior men who were the last race of the day after thousands of runners had churned up the already boggy round.
There was a determined effort from all of the Vale athletes with the first success of the day coming from Kitty Shepherd Cross who finished a brilliant 19th out of over 240 runners in the girls U15 race over 4k in a time of 18:34. Kitty is Buckinghamshire County Champion for her age group as is Alice Wright was our only other lady runner of the day in the U20 ladies race. Alice had a good run and was 46th out of 85.
Will Ralston was our only younger competitor in the men’s 6k U17 race where he finished a very credible 127th from almost 200 runners in a time of 24:46.
The senior men seem to have made an adventure of the day. Travelling together by Land Rover they got temporarily lost on Hampstead Heath courtesy of some interesting navigation, but undaunted, they managed to make it to the start line along with over 1000 other competitors.
First back in just over an hour was Martyn Summerfield (255th overall), closely followed by David Maisey (269th), Mark Richards (364th) and Sean Wilson (402th), all demonstrating determination and good form.
Ducking under 67 minutes, new father Lewis Meredith (487th) was fifth back for the Vale, followed by Henrik Hartmann in the pleasing time of 1:11:11 (669th).
Supporting their scoring teammates were Alan Roberts (732nd) and last-back Henry Edwardes-Evans, 755th in 75 minutes. The team finished a very pleasing 38th out of 70 describing the day as ‘the most exhausting but oddly memorable race of the year’. As always they received fantastic support from Pat Card, with Rhiannon and Paige Meredith who were extremely vocal on the course.