Captain’s Log

Another resounding victory for the men’s cross-country team means we are definitely going to be promoted to Division 2 – as long as 6 runners finish the last race – and we are very likely to win the Division outright. Both ‘A’ and ‘B’ teams won comfortably; the ‘B’ team would have finished a very snug 4^th among the ‘A’ teams.

First I’d like to congratulate and thank all those involved in the set-up and organisation of the event on the day, from the course to the marshals and the burger bar – very professional and efficient, well done. Thanks too all those people cheering on the runners, especially Steve James, who covered 8.56 miles sprinting around the park shouting.

Race

Jamie Johnston, fresh from his county glory – where, by rights, he should be representing Warwickshire for placing 6^th – moved up another notch to finish a very close 4^th, just 23 seconds off the winner. Following Jamie was our home-grown powerhouse, Deano, who, in his most aggressive and best performance so far, romped home 6^th – I look forward to seeing these 2 guys in particular re-write the club records from 5K to ½ marathon in the summer. That’s if Rob Andrew, running despite coughing like a Chief stoker, doesn’t get there first. Rob cruised home – looking remarkably untroubled - in 8^th after a cautious start. Starting even more cautiously was your team captain, nursing a dodgy calf. Luckily I was able to finish uninjured and just inside the top 10 (10^th). Hot on my trail was none other than ‘he-who-does-not-train’, Mike Ferguson, who, despite having ‘missed’ training due to having had the dreaded Novo virus, had one of the best runs of the day in finishing 13^th! (and thereby beating K. Loundes, a 34 min 10K man). Closing the scoring for the first team was Dave Harte with a fine performance – after warm weather training over Xmas - in 20^th (up 6 places from the last race), forcing one of Bournville’s best distance men, Sean, out of the scoring 6. Sean has missed a great deal of training and has only just begun putting the miles in.

Mike Berry, another athlete who slipped off for warm weather training over the New Year, had another solid run in 31^st – just a minute shy of scoring for the ‘A’ team; Andy Crawford came home 36^th, not a bad run considering he’d been bed-ridden with ‘man-flu’ a few weeks earlier. A relatively new Bournville Harrier, Mark Hobbs, showed a clean pair of heels to more experienced BvHs by finishing 47^th, in front of Ollie ‘the footballer’ Hindle (50^th). Another whippersnapper, James Taylor, continued his steep improvement curve by finishing 57^th (up from 66^th last time out) and giving experienced cross country men, Paul ‘the web’ Foot (59^th) and ‘no-longer-so-big’ Phil Dakin (60^th), some gip in the process (it was calculated afterwards that if James continued at this trajectory he’d be 9 minutes in front of the winner at next year’s Sennerley’s Park XC!). Phil has made a welcomed return to form, but couldn’t get by Paul, who gave it all he had to hold him off.  Young Simon Varcoe was next home in a credible 77^th, followed closely by a fast improving Mark Smith (up 10 places to 84^th). Terry Doherty had a good workout in 91^st – all good preparation for the roads, where big Tel excels – chased home by Steve Hopkins in 94^th, Graham Beavers in 129^th and David Human, slipping-and-a-sliding in his training shoes, in 161^st from a good field of 168 runners.

Well done everyone.

We are thinking of meeting up on Saturday evening after the final cross-country for a few beers to celebrate our promotion and, hopefully, our victory, so pencil this date in your diaries.

Jon