True cross country conditions faced the Rugby & Northampton AC athletes at the Warwickshire County Championships last weekend. A challenging, muddy and in parts waterlogged course combined with wet conditions for most of the day faced the competitors at Cofton Park, Birmingham.
The day got off to a flying start with a tremendous finishing 200m by Georgina Woodward to take the bronze medal in the U13G race and secure her Warwickshire team selection for the inter-counties championships .
Another medal swiftly followed with the U13B team of Edward Faulds, Cian Hutton and Myles Martin taking team bronze having finished 6th, 13th and 21st respectively, with Dan Carey just behind in 23rd place. A gutsy run from Edward puts him in the selectors minds for the Warwickshire team.
The U15 girls Hollie Moore and Olivia Sheehan lined up with a very competitive field and demonstrated their determination and improvement over the season to finish an impressive 5th and 11th respectively to give the Warwickshire team managers food for thought.
Most of the U15 boys competing are bottom of the age group and Jack Carey produced an outstanding performance to take 10th place with Thomas Haynes 16th, Rhys James 25th . Tilly Lea matched Jack with a 10th place in the U20 womens race.
The final race for the junior athletes produced another medal, this time a well deserved silver for Elisha de Mello in the U20s in one of the most competitive fields of the day.
The Senior/Masters ladies faced two laps totalling 6K were represented by Victoria Nealon who took 18th in her first county champs, Anna Harington (55th) Marion Allen (57th) and Wendy Jennings (58th).
A large senior men’s team ran over 11km and the standard was, as ever,extremely high but the athletes acquitted themselves extremely well. The first Rugby athlete across the line was Paul Birch who finished 14th in the race – 4th Master (over 35) in a time of 38 mins 12 – a truly outstanding performance! The next finisher was Stephen Marks in 39 mins 43 for 27th in the race – 11th Master. Stephen was closely followed by Ian Botheroyd and Dean Oldfield. These four made up the four scorers in the Masters team which finished in silver position – the first medal in the senior race for several years. The first “senior” across the line for Rugby and Northampton was Alistair Mcdonnel who produced a massive improvement to finish in 40th position in a time of 41 mins 20. Other finshers were Paul Shotton 63, Mike Andrews 77, Daniel Williams 79, John Taylor 98, Colin Durant 117, Laurence Scott 122 and Steve Childs 131. There were 175 finishers.
