National Schools' Cross Country Championships

This was the final, and most competitive, ‘National’ of the season.  Only the top eight runners in each age/gender category for each county qualify for this race so it was a major achievement for our runners just to compete here and a fine reward for the training that each of them has put in over the last few years.

Because the Championships are held at a different location each year our runners are used to facing different conditions but this was to prove a particularly challenging course: the ground was hard (no mud at all) and flat!  It was inevitable that the track athletes would do better here than the cross-country specialists.

Every race was run at a very high pace but we still managed some excellent results.  Highlights of the day came from Finn and Harris who finished superbly in 14^th and 15^th respectively out of 338 runners in the Inter Boys’ race, just missing out on international selection.  Harris will get another chance in this age group next year being a year-young in this race.  Alexander also put in a good performance in this race as he continues his recovery from illness.

Olivia had a fantastic run in the Senior Girls’ race coming in 107^th out of 301 finishers, despite being a year young and in the Junior Boys’ event Benjy had a great race being placed 128^th out of 345 finishers.  Isaac, a year-young, also ran well in the Junior Boys’ event, experiencing this National for the first time.  A very well done to all our runners!