ATW Metropolitan Cross Country League – Race 1

Claybury was much wetter under foot than we’ve been used to in recent years and spikes or studs were required for a change.
In the women’s race, the first (short) lap seemed to be dominated by Woodford Green with Essex Ladies up at the front but by the end of the two longer laps many of them had slipped down the field and the race was won by Lorna Russell from Enfield and Haringey. First Serpies over the line were Becky Glover (4th) and Sarah Pemberton (5th). Sam Ludlow-Taylor, our 6th runner, finished in 25th place at which point we were pretty sure we’d won. This was confirmed in the results today:
- Serpentine 218 points
- Woodford Green with Essex Ladies 198 points
- Shaftsbury Barnet Harriers 161 points
Our usual rivals, Highgate Harriers, had a very poor day, finishing 7th with just 119 points, behind our B team in 6th place (123 points). In division 2, our women’s C team are leading with 282 points so if the rest of the season follows yesterday’s pattern we could easily have 3 teams in division 1 next season! In the vets race, Serpie women are again in the lead at the top of division 1, with our B team 6th and C team 3rd in division 2.
The men’s race was very competitive with some extremely quick times at the front of the race and a lot of U20 athletes competing. Our men’s team was missing a couple of the fastest members but it wouldn’t have made much difference had they raced, there were just a lot of guys a lot faster than we were. The rest of the season is going to be tough. First Serpie over the line was Andy Greenleaf (12th) followed by Richard Phillips (27th). The final results were:
- Woodford Green with Essex Ladies 1161 points
- Highgate Harriers 1107 points
- Serpentine 891 points
Our B team is 9th in division 1 with 340 points and our C team 4th in division 2. In the vets race, Serpentine A lead division 1, Serpentine B lead division 2 and Serpentine C are 10th in division 3.
Serpie results are on our website: women and men.
There are full results on the League website as well as the Active Training World website.
Thanks to Malcolm French and Sally Hodge for helping with the registration and recording.
Ian Hodge
Competition & team Events Coordinator
ihodge@serpentine.org.uk
Responses