Team Southampton sent a select band of runners to compete at this weekends National Cross country championships at Alton Towers in Staffordshire.

As you'd expect with something at Alton Towers it was an event with plenty of ups and downs and also thrills and spills!

The course was set in spectacular rolling hills just beside the famous theme park and attracted a huge entry from clubs all over England. In the younger age groups the sight of 300 plus runners setting off over the rough grassland that the course was on was inspiring and the clubs young runners did well amongst the high class fields assembled.

Top individual performance on the day for the club was Louise Webb who ran in the combined U17/U20 womens race. Webb stuck close to the leaders throughout the race and performed well racing against runners up to three years older than her, including the current European cross country champion Stephanie Twell, who won the combined race on the day. Webb finished just outside the top 10 in 11th place in the U17 age group but was in a closely packed group where only 10 seconds separated her at the end from the 4th place finisher. Also running well in the same race and finishing in 36th place was Aiya Abe who will be very pleased with this position in a National event. Also running well for the club was Jamie Knapp in the U17 age group who ran over a slightly longer distance. He took a creditable 31st place finishing in a time of 15mins and 42 seconds.

In the U15 boys race the club had 4 runners competing and leading them in was Louis Gates who came in 39th place and giving the team a good overall 21st place finish. Also running in the team was Simon campbell (137th), Ben Winstanley(187th) and Martin campbell (265th).

A number of the clubs runners will be next appearing at the English Schools championships in Liverpool in early March where they will hope to continue their success.

Please Note:
These results are based on information sent to me. Any problems with names / times / positions then e-mail teamsouthampton@hotmail.com