Men's Surrey Cross-country championships, Denbies, 7 Jan 2018

A day to reflect

 The Surreys are always run in a good, competitively charged atmosphere and are darn difficult to win.  Although the Bels have a great history in the event, just a couple of wins in the last half-century is pretty grim stuff, but the last decade has been outstanding.  Yes, just the one title, but 9 podiums and some splendid days to savour.Our results, below, this millennium represent the perfect bell curve – to the point!  Check out 2006:  299 points for 7th and same again a dozen years later.  And what a ride in the interim.  Look at those two forays in to sub-83 point territory - and neither got the gold - what more could we do?!  And that all took some real building as just finishing a squad was impossible in five out of six of our first attempts of the 21st C.So, what news of the 2018 lads who were missing some heavy-hitters.  To the naked eye, aging!  But that sneers at the great talent of our M50 and M55 to close us in, and actually the average age of the team was 35, which is just about spot on.  We also had three real young’uns, and a dazzling late-30’er.That of course was Paskar, who boasts two amazing streaks at this one:  9 Surreys in a row, and even better, six top 5’s in a row, quite outstanding, what a club treasure he remains.  Paskar wasn’t over enthused with his run – watch out Coulsdon!Nick Buckle was predicted 8th by the TM, but he did it the hard way.  Instead of steadily working through he darted into 7th in the opening salvoes and then spent the next 40 minutes of his life grimly hanging on.  He slipped to 9th in the last 400, but a brilliant last-gasp kick took out a fine runner.Ross can be very proud to be the 3rd best we had to offer on this day, as can Arne close behind, occupying the same scoring berth as last year, but near doubling his total.  Hey, he’ll take it considering his recent troubles.Patrick and Mike were both excellent too; and we were assuaged to have the strength of Alex Mills and Rob Norville acting as sentries.So, in a very competitive race we’ve been better, but not medalling here adds considerable value to that amazing nine year streak.See our Facebook page for more photos.1 G Gathercole (AFD) 39:18; 5 P Owor 40:10; 8 N Buckle 40:46; 55 R Finlay 45:24; 62 A Dumez 45:48; 70 P McDougall (M50) 46:21; 99 M Trees (M55) 49:03; 116 A Mills 50:06; 142 R Norville 51:25.  220 finished.1 HW  88; 2 AFD 139; 3 G&G 141; 4 SLH 144... 7 Belg 299.  18 clubs closed in. Belgrave at the Surreys 2000-2018: 

Year team position team score athlete and pos
2018 7 299 5 P Owor 8 N Buckle 55 R Finlay 62 A Dumez 70 P McDougall 99 M Trees
2017 3 150 1 P Wicks 7 A Jaksevicius 28 J Williams 32 A Dumez 38 R Maddams 44 P Owor
2016 3 153 1 P Wicks 4 A Jaksevicius 5 P Owor 42 R Maddams 49 N Smallwood 52 W Cockerell
2015 2 136 1 P Owor 15 A Jaksevicius 19 T Telkovsky 25 N Bundle 29 R Maddams 47 W Cockerell
2014 3 197 5 P Owor 21 W Cockerell 22 J Browne 46 R Maddams 47 M Welsh 56 K Hegvold
2013 1 83 1 P Owor 3 J Kelly 4 P Wicks 19 W Cockerell 26 K Hegvold 30 M Trees
2012 2 82 3 J Kelly 6 D Agustus 14 R Stannard 18 P Owor 19 W Cockerell 22 R Ward
2011 2 77 1 P Wicks 5 J Kelly 10 P Owor 12 W Cockerell 23 L Eguia 26 M Trees
2010 2 116 1 P Owor 14 J Fairbourn 16 L Eguia 18 W Cockerell 30 M Byansi 37 M Trees
2009 3 125 1 P Wicks 2 J Kelly 14 W Cockerell 15 M Trees 41 T Fordyce 52 M Humphrey
2008 4 162 1 P Wicks 3 J Kelly 18 J Fairbourn 23 K Hegvold 30 T Weeks 87 R Merrick
2007 5 265 1 P Wicks 12 M Trees 15 M Byansi 19 W Cockerell 32 R Stannard 149 D Anderson
2006 7 299 5 P Wicks 15 W Cockerell 33 W Lynch 44 T Weeks 65 T Fordyce 134 M Humphrey
2005 - - 17 W Cockerell 20 K Hegvold 32 W Lynch
2004 - - 2 K Nash 22 W Cockerell 35 W Lynch 97 D Anderson
2003 - - 16 R Alsop 17 R Ward 77 W Cockerell
2002 - - 20 W Cockerell 51 M Kazimierski 99 D Anderson
2001 5 195 2 K Nash 21 R Alsop 32 M Byansi 41 E Lemenager 43 L Catley 66 S Zealy
2000 - - 7 R Alsop 8 A Stewart 37 W Cockerell 76 D Anderson
Scoring runs and points (6th for first scorer to 1 for 6th)
W Cockerell 15 55
P Wicks 8 46
P Owor 9 42
J Kelly 5 26
R Alsop 3 17
A Jaksevicius 3 15
M Trees 5 12
W Lynch 3 12
K Nash 2 12
K Hegvold 4 11
D Anderson 4 11
R Maddams 4 10
M Byansi 3 10
J Fairbourn 2 9
A Dumez 2 6
R Stannard 2 6
L Eguia 2 6
R Ward 2 6
N Buckle 1 5
D Agustus 1 5
T Weeks 2 5
M Kazimierski 1 5
A Stewart 1 5
R Finlay 1 4
J Williams 1 4
T Telkovsky 1 4
J Browne 1 4
T Fordyce 2 4
N Bundle 1 3
E Lemenager 1 3
P McDougall 1 2
N Smallwood 1 2
M Welsh 1 2
M Humphrey 2 2
L Catley 1 2
R Merrick 1 1
S Zealy 1 1