Winchester Running Club had a brilliant pair of top six finishes at the iconic English National Cross Country Championships in Shropshire last weekend.
The newly formed club, which already has more than 200 members, had won eight titles earlier this year at the Hampshire Cross Country Championships and were also crowned champions in the Under-15 boys category at the South of England Championships in January.
The national championships – which were first staged in 1876 and have been won previously by the likes of Dave Bedford, Paula Radcliffe and Ron Hill – had to be postponed due to flooding in February and were being staged for the first time in September.
It made for unusually firm and dry conditions, with the Under-15 boys’ team first out and in real contention for a podium finish.
The team standings are decided by the aggregate of the first four finishers in each team, with Casper Wilson leading the Winchester runners with an individual finish of eighth from a field of almost 250 of the best young endurance runners in the country.
He was followed in for Winchester by county champion Ethan Skipwith, last year’s Hampshire schools 1500m champion Ivor Martin, South of England road 5km champion Seth Noott, and Thomas Savill, who, with another year still left in the age category, made it five Winchester boys in the top 80.
A tense wait for the final count up of results ensued, with Winchester missing the medals by just 12 aggregate places behind bronze medallists Chelmsford to take a still excellent fourth.
The Under-17 boys then followed over a 6km distance and, on what was an undulating course, also soon showed the benefit of the club’s weekly hill sessions, which are overseen at the Badger Farm Meadows by coaches Nick Anderson and Andy Parkinson.
Stan Parkinson, Sam Wilkinson and Ieuan Thomas all featured strongly near the front of the race and eventually all finished within 16 seconds of each other. Parkinson was first home in 47th followed by Wilkinson, who has another year in the age category in 56th and Thomas, who was racing for the first time since May following injury in an excellent 59th. Also racing from the year down was Aiden Furby and he crucially made up the fourth place in the team to seal an overall position of sixth ahead of some of the biggest clubs in the country.
Grace Baker was also competing for Winchester Running Club in the Under-15 girls national championships and, demonstrating her quality in longer distance events, constantly moved up through the field for an eventual finishing position of 57th from a mass field of almost 200.
Attention now turns on Saturday for Winchester’s young long distance runners to the South of England Road Relays championships in Aldershot.
