Sixteen Herne Hill Harriers' teams contested this great event, and returned with a medal haul that Robin Hood would have been proud of.
Our all conquering U18 Men's team completed the quadruple, adding this title to their wins at the Southern and National Road Relays, and Southern Cross Country Relays. James Clements Nash led off with a brilliant opening 3km leg, 8.47 and 4th quickest overall, with Tommy Clerkin, 8.58, then moving us into lead position, and Caspian Holmes completing the job with an excellent 8.44 which was second quickest overall leg. Our B team in 19th were the first B team, led off by Zachary Morris who had a nasty fall, 9.51, followed by Leau Roch, 9.24, and Luca Boulton, 9.13
For the first time our Senior Women won the National Cross Country Relay title, with a storming winning margin of more than 50 seconds in this 3 x 3km event. Led off by our reigning National Cross Country Champion Lucy Jones, who finished an excellent 3rd on the opening leg with the fourth quickest time of the day, 9.25, she handed to Sophie Tooley who took us into a lead that was never relinquished. If the opposition were not already spooked (it was after all halloween), we had Olympian Katie Snowden on the anchor leg to bring it home, with the third quickest individual time of the day, 9.23. It is twenty years since Katie joined Herne Hill Harriers, and what a great ambassador she has been for our women's section, fifty years after females were first admitted to the Club. It is something special to see a National Cross Country Champion, Lucy Jones, combine with Katie the Olympian, and Club stalwart and an outstanding athlete in her own right, Sophie Tooley, to take this title.
Our U14 Boys ran brilliantly to secure silver medals, with Josh Lotter leading the way with 2nd on leg one, and 2nd quickest overall time of the day. Rafe Horne and Tommy Howard completed the team, with the latter moving from 6th to 2nd on the final leg. It has been a great start to the winter for these multi medalists, and we also closed a B team in 42nd position.
Our Senior Men produced their best ever performance in this event, improving on last year's 11th with a 5th place finish in this 4 x 5km event. Danny Shaw produced an excellent opening leg, 15.30, and was then followed by our two best male distance runners, Sam Bramwell and Arlo Ludewick. Sam ran one of the quickest times of the day, 14.45, to take us from 26th to 6th place, with British 1500m champion Arlo Ludewick then moving us to 3rd place with his 14.51 leg. Ollie Mills anchored the team, running 15.56, on this testing circuit. We are getting ever closer to medals in these big championship events. Our B team finished 65th, and there was an excellent debut for the Club by Ben Fitzpatrick, with his 16.18 leg.
Congratulations to all of our other teams who competed at Mansfield. Our U14 Girls finished an excellent 7th with Olivia Fisher, 7.40, Phoebe McNee 7.53 and Freya Greenhalgh, 8.06, and our B team were 26th. Our U16 Girls were 11th and 52nd and our U16 Boys 14th and 40th. Our U18 Women have had an excellent season with strong team turnouts, and were 13th and 27th in their 3 x 2.5km race.
For the first time this event included a mixed relay comprising 4 x 1mile legs, and it was great to see our team in this inaugural race finish in 24th position, with three U20 athletes and a fourth who is marginally older.
A very proud day for the Club indeed, another on which we proved ourselves to be one of the very best distance clubs in the country across the age groups.