Out of the January gloom a CC6 fixture emerged to reveal a resurgent club performance on a “proper muddy” course round the Itchen Valley CP on the third Sunday of 2026. 16 WRC club members represented us in this penultimate league (and fifth) race for the winter season. The course was just over 4.5 miles of mixed terrain including muddy trails, gravel and even the odd puddle. The season has been a mixed bag for the club, but this January fixture brought us new blood with recent members Josh Lennard Jone, Ross Smith, Euan Ramage and Lynne Whittaker. We hope you have got the CC6 bug now! Both men’s and women’s teams came second on the day. The men’s scoring team consisted of Julian Mann (5th) and age category winner, debutante Josh (11th), Pere Sansome (12th) another age category winner and Paul Horler (28) yet another age category winner. The women’s team was lead in by Ellie Swire with a captain’s performance (3), Becky Hutton (7) and Liz Marshall (15). We were then all greeted at the finishing line with a warm welcome as the cake stall lurked beyond the race funnel.
This puts our men’s team second so far, with Julian and Pete 3rd and 4th respecitvely for the season with Pete leading the V50 category and Martyn West the V70 leader to date. But with one more race this still plenty to play for! The next race we will be hosting (so we cant run it) but we are looking for volunteers to marshall (and provide cake) on the 8 February at Badger Farm (behind Sainsbury’s supermarket), and then the final fixture for the season will be at Itchen Valley Country Park (again) on 1 March.
Not sure what all this CC6 stuff is? Its a free untimed sunday morning cross country league, consisting of up to 5 miles of trails, open to club members. Just bring your club top and link your parkrun barcode here https://rb.gy/yzxajy and compete with club runners from across south Hampshire and the New Forest. Oh and did I mention cake?
Yours the Cake runner