News reports - November 2024

23rd November 2024 68 club runners at muddy Sefton Park Cross Challenge event

(Revised with updated Senior results)The second Mid Lancs XC fixture took place on Saturday in Sefton Park. Liverpool, where we joined up with the UKA Cross Challenge event, probably the biggest annual cross country event in the Northwest. The Mid Lancs, Red Rose and Liverpool & District league runners have the opportunity to run with the best cross country runners in the country. It’s a spectacular event and the Mid Lancs fixture closes to home for us.

It was clear, however, that weather would play an important role in this fixture. After a week of cold but benign weather, storm Bert was forecast for the weekend with weather alerts in North England and Wales with snow, heavy rain, and gale force winds. On the day, however, we fared better than most of the country with little wind and occasional showers. Conditions did affect numbers with some runners unable or unwilling to travel in some treacherous driving condition.

The Sefton Park course was the wettest I have ever seen it and the surface quickly cut up becoming very muddy indeed. Ankle deep and more in places! Senior distances were also reduced to cater for the Under 23 international selection distances; probably a welcome change, particularly as the featureless loop through the main field was removed this year.

Over 900 Mid Lancs runners were entered for this fixture; possibly a record number. Southport Waterloo also had its highest participation with 76 entered via the Mid Lancs. Including a couple of direct entries and Under 11s running for Sefton Primary schools, we had over 80.

The meeting started with the European Short Course trial races where spectators watched Joshua Lay run 1500m on wet grass in 4 mins 31 and Maddie Deadman win the female 1500m in 5 mins 15.

The age group races started with the Under 11s where Challenge and League youngsters were joined by runners from the Merseyside borough primary schools. With apologies for any school runner I didn’t know as a Southport Waterloo runner, our Under 11 Girls were led home by Amelie Roberts, 73rd of 182 runners in 9:22 for her 2 kms lap, ahead of Ava Abrahms, 77th in 9:24, Lily Clare, 84th in 9:27, and Sasha McNabb, 124th in 10:01. Amelie and Sasha ran for Sefton Schools and Ava and Lily for Liverpool Schools.

We had 8 Under 11 Boys running. Best of the bunch was newcomer Marcus Larkin one of six running for Sefton Primary schools. He was 8th overall of 198 runners in 7.35 for the 2 kms. Clearly, one to watch! Thomas Delamere was 29th in 7:53. Matthew Ndjambula was 64th in 8:22, Sam Coughlan, 78th in 8:27, William Paybody, 96th in 8:34, Jack Mainey, 132nd in 8:56, Harvey Lloyd, 156th in 9:12 and Tom Winslow 165th in 9:21.

It was really impressive to see 10 of our Under 13 Girls running the Sefton Park course. Lucy Delamere led them home, 19th of 132 runners in 12:22 for her 3 km large lap. Others were Amelia Salkeld, 91st in 14:48, Caitlin Webster, 99th in 15:03, Alisa McCann, 106th in 15:28, Sophie Burns, 115th in 16:01, Renee Coulson, 124th in 17:43, Rosalie Styles, 126th in 18:27, Ivy Speers, 129th in 20:50, Ella Boyd, 130th in 22:40, and Olivia Hatch-McDermott, 131st in 22:43.

In the Under 13 Boys’ race James McGrory was 22nd of 109 in 11:26, also over 3 kms. George Hawthorn was 52nd in 12:30, Lewis McIlroy, 69th in 13:13, and James Silcox, 82nd in 13:48. Oliver Kimball also ran but had to pull out just before the Finisah. The Under 15s also ran over the 3 kms large lap. Our Under 15 Girls were Lauren Silcox, Sienna Fortune, Daisy Wong, Sophy O’Leary and Olivia Johnson. Lauren was first home for the club 49th of 135 in 12:30 followed by Sienna, 61st in 12:51, Daisy, 112th in 14:52, Sophie, 119th in 15:25, and Olivia 123rd in 15:46.

Will Delamere, Caleb Still and Eddy Clark, our most successful Under 15 road and cross country relay team, led our Under 15 Boys home. Will was an impressive 5th of 144 runners – our highest placed runner on the day – in 10:02. Caleb was 14th in 10:18 and Eddy 43rd in 10:53. Others were Evan Thomas, 77th in 11:39, Richard Berry, 93rd in 12:11, Daniel Shalliker, 99th in 12:24, Spencer Campbell, 115th in 12:58, and Harry Lavery, 129 in 13:35.

The Under 17 and Under 20 Woman ran together over 4.4 kms, a short and a long lap. Our Under 17 Women were Sydney Monahan Clarkson, 58th of 105 in 19:12. Amelie Scott was 94th in 21:35, Eva Meredith was 97th in 21:48 and Isla Gray, 102nd in 22:59. Under 20 Woman Emily Dean was 77th of 95 runners in 19:09. Being in different age groups, they won’t often run together but it was significant, I thought, that Sydney finished just 3 seconds behind Emily, a very experience cross country runner!

The Under 17 and Under 20 Men also ran together, over 4.4 kms. Liam McCormick led our Under 17 Men home, 70th of 166 in 15:49, ahead of Luke Ward, 80th in 16:04, Theo Osborne, 150th in 18:38 and Will Rothwell, 153rd in 18:51. Under 20 Man Julius Zajitschek was 154th in 18:52. Under 20 Reuben Donnelly also ran but was forced to retire with a hamstring injury.

These were great numbers in the Junior age groups. Not only was it the most I can recall but we actually had runners in every age category. A rarity! Not every track runner will be a good cross country runner and not all will enjoy it but as part of a winter training regime to build strength and endurance it is in a class of its own. Hopefully the many who ran today will have enjoyed the experience and continue with Cross Country through the winter. But even if you didn’t much enjoy it, think of the benefits.

Moving on to the Seniors, against a backdrop of high club participation in this fixture, it was disappointing that we only had 4 Senior Women entered and only 1 competed. Andrea Scarborough was 105th of 308 runners- well up in the top third of the field – running 39:31 for 8 kms, and is our 2024 Female Cross Country champion.

An Impressive 16 of our Senior Men finished their race, led home by Ben Johnson, 99th of 537 runners in 30:40 for his 8 kms and retaining his title as club Cross Country Champion. Francois Rafferty was not far behind, 110th in 31:06 with David Hamilton 147th in 32:19, Mark Wynne, 151st in 32:34, George Ingram, 152nd in 32:36, and Alex Veron was the final team counter, 155th in 32:48. Ben Stones rean 33:20, John Delamere, 33:35, Marc Singer, 34:40, Steve Wilkinson, 36:06, Stephen Ward, 37:54, Peter Roome, 38:00, Neil Adshead, 38@36, Carl McMahon, 40:53, Mike Cunningham, 42:11, Graham Cuddy, 43:15, Paul Warrington, 43:39, Lee Coupland, 47:57, and Ian Pike 59:25. Ken Lennon also ran but isn’t yet in results.

We will have to await the Mid Lancs extract from the results to see how Sefton Park affects the league standings, hopefully positively.

Items left in the club tent from this fixture were: Karrmoor waterproof trousers (large); Niki black socks; right hand black glove; New Look 915 generation black puffer jacket (age 12-13); Mountain Warehouse Isodry hiking boots (size 8). Please contact Ron Scott to claim.

Additional photos by Graham Boreham.

The next Cross County event is the M'side County Champs at Arrowe Park on 14th December and the next Mid Lancs fixture is in Blackpool on Saturday 11th January.

Full Results. ! Prov'l Mid Lancs Results

2nd November 2024 Top 5 finish for U15 Boys at England Cross Country Relays (By Graham Boreham)

Hot on the heels of the Northern Cross Country relays was the ECCA National cross country relays, held at Berry Hill Park in Mansfield, which has hosted the event since 1989. After having to withdraw last year due to injuries, this time the U15 boys’ team of William Delamere, Eddy Clark and Caleb Still were all at full fitness and of the 5 relays they’ve competed in over the last couple of months, this was by far their best race.

The course at Berry Hill Park is very much up and down, although nothing on the scale of Graves Park 2 weeks ago. The ground was surprisingly firm for the start of November with little in the way of mud and even by the U15 Boys’ race, which was the 8th of the programme, it hadn’t cut up at all making for some very fast running. Will was on the opening leg as has been the case in the previous 4 relays and quickly established himself in the front group with his closest opposition mostly being the same boys from the England Road Relays 4 weeks ago. As we’ve come to expect from him, his 2km leg was absolutely solid and he passed over to Eddy in 5th position.

Eddy had a great run on the 2nd leg, looking very strong throughout. Over his 2km the positions changed regularly and while the front 3 of Cambridge & Coleridge, Herne Hill and Dacorum were some way ahead, a real scrap was on for 4th-8th position. In a close finish with Woodford Green and Hallamshire he passed onto Caleb in 6th position but he was very quickly back past Woodford Green and right on the shoulder of Hallamshire after only 200m or so. After another 300m he made his move and all the way through the woods he opened up a sizeable gap in 4th and made some ground up on Dacorum in 3rd. Coming into the finish he held off a late surge from Hallamshire and brought the team home in 4th out of 69 complete teams to finish, a superb result against the best teams from around the country. In addition, Caleb had run the quickest anchor leg time and the 5th quickest time overall out of 234 athletes, while Will’s opening leg time was the 8th quickest overall.

A huge well done to all 3 boys over the series of autumn relays; gold at the North West and Northern Road Relays, 4th at the England Road Relays, silver at the Northern XC Relays and 4th here is a brilliant set of results that they can all be rightly proud of. I know we’ll be seeing them at all of them next year too in the U17 races.