No medals this time for Charnwood AC at the National Cross Country Championships held at Parliament Hill London in the face of competition from England’s best club athletes, but some fine performances nonetheless across the age ranges to do the club and town proud, and the best performing Midlands team in several categories.

 

The Under 13 boys team finished in 42nd place, with Tom Dixon best individually placed in 70th. He was supported  by Sean McCann in 153rd, Sam Haines in 345th and Frankie Bevilacqua Masunda in 423rd. Charlie Coleston-Shields also took 428th spot.

 

The Under 13 girls took a very creditable 15th place, with Gracie-Rose Walters in 54th, followed by Rachel Newport in 102nd, Savana Smith in 120th and Emilia Unwin 239th.

Olivia McFarlane took 388th place.

 

A fine 6th team finish was claimed by the Under 15 boys, led by Vinnie Dawson in 30th, followed home by Alex Coleston- Shields in 76th, Marcus Francis in 96th and Ryan Elston in 100th. Jamie Day followed in 101st with Seamus Hurst in 246th and Lucas Wolf-Pudney in 374th.

 

The Under 15 girls finished a good 27th, with Gemma Newport in 79th, Lexie McLoughlin 114th, Olivia Bonshor 146th and Mar Ruiz-Monserrat 354th.

 

The Under 17 men came closest to a podium place on the day, missing out narrowly on the bronze medal to finish 4th whilst well clear of the next team. Ollie Rouse led the team home in 20th, with Kieren Coleman-Smith in 26th, Luke Nuttall 35th and Ethan O’Shea 58th.

A debut run for Alfie White in 352nd completed the squad.

 

Insufficient numbers prevented the Under 17 ladies, Junior men or Junior ladies from fielding full teams, but there were fine individual performances in the Under 17 ladies from Mia Atkinson in 12th, Eleanor Here 63rd and Hannah Seager 91st.

 

For the Junior men, Thomas Gostelow ran well to finish in 48th as did Finn Lydon in 61st.

 

Amy Hammersley was the sole representative in the Junior ladies, and took a good 66th place.

 

A large field of over 1100 finishers and 112 teams saw the Senior ladies team claim a tremendous 7th spot, with a superb 8th finish for Juliet Potter closely followed by Jane Potter in 14th. Good support followed from Anne Holyland in 91st and Elsie Butler in 107th.

Fine runs also for Katie Lomas in 142nd, Lauren Smith in 347th, Catherine Tinker 407th,  Mariam Getachew 487th, Louise Richmond 499th

 

The final race of the day saw another huge field, this time over 2300 for the Senior men’s race, with Charnwood taking a very respectable 56th place out of 162 teams.

 

First home was Mark Couldwell in 161st place, supported by Tom Lupton in 204th, William Kirk 473rd, George Buttery 935th, Samuel Densham 1072nd and James Ketteringham 1087th.

The squad was completed by Nick Rees 1214th and Nick White 1310th.