Herne Hill Harriers’ Chris Busaileh ended a 44 year wait for the club as he won gold in the South of Thames Cross Country Championships on Saturday. It was the Harriers first gold in this event since 1967 won by club legend Mike Gowan.
Chris’ winning performance rewarded him with his first individual championship gold medal with a time of 41mins and 40secs. Harriers’ Alan Barnes finished in second place to win silver with a time of 42mins 02secs having battled for the lead for much of the 7.5 mile course.
Following a successful cross country season for the club’s young athletes, a number were selected to represent their county schools teams at the English Schools Cross Country Championship on Saturday.
Merhawi Yemane placed a very strong 9th in the junior boys race, Lascelles Hussey 30th, Katie Snowden, 16th in the senior girls, Lewis Lloyd, 24th in the senior boys and Victoria Picken, 44th in the junior girls, all in fields with over 300 finishers.
Elsewhere, the Harriers’ Ros Kieran followed up a recent women’s win in the Wimbledon 10k with a strong run at the Dorney Lake Half Marathon in Windsor, finishing 1st woman by a huge margin of over 10 minutes, but 4th overall in the race with a time of 77mins and 53secs.
In the Hastings Half Marathon, M45 athlete Kofi Agyei ran 78.20, while at the Reading Half marathon Jeff Cunningham and Paul Shiel led the HHH men with times of 71.40 and 80.47 respectively and at the Fleet Half Marathon Ben Paviour placed a good 8th in 71.58.
