Three Gongs and a Very Close Call

Wimbledon Common, 22 November 2014

What a terrific day this was for both Belgrave’s squads. One can always tell when things are gelling by the amount of withdrawals in the week before. Our 19 entered runners saw an amazing 17 start. Usually one can expect to lose at least 30% of an entered squad in the week leading up to a race.

The horror days of the first Surrey League are long gone for the men, as their shameful 8-to-run there, saw us winning the 8-to-score title here for a remarkable turnabout.

And the women matched their exceptional score of 29 points last year, but in a field that had grown from 65-105. It’s only three years ago that the TM couldn’t raise a quartet this one.

We all knew PO would be a handful after he sent a hilarious email to the squad midweek saying how he would be the “mange of Wimbledon Common” and that he would have a good trip "like a Lion looking for deer meat". Mildly terrifying stuff, and his win of over 30 seconds was a fantastic piece of front-running.

The women had six very fit runners fighting for the four scoring spots. We were concerned about Kerimac after her breathing difficulties last week, but she managed to hang in there and grab a gold medal for her trouble. Mel narrowly lost the championship title to the rarely seen but classy Stacey Ward; while ZLD was less than a minute behind, with Catherine continuing her quiet ascent to finish one tick behind the redoubtable Karen Ellison, last year’s winner. With Jojo having a solid run in 13^th, and Genia securely in the top two dozen, there was never any doubt that the Jim Heathfield trophy would be returning to us.

Has there ever been a more congested battle for the final scoring spot in a Belgrave men’s team?  If PO, Taras and Gus looked like our leading trio – and how well they ran, with Gus’s calf just about holding up – here was a quartet of ravenous Rottweilers looking to close us in. Would it be new man Andrius, who had already done a Parkrun; the skipper back from a bad chest; the Bundle of speed; or the ‘Pillar who had scored in 116/119 cross-country races for Belgrave. Well, the latter never even saw the others the whole race, so make that 116/120. Roy was also set to miss out, whilst Nick kept Andy in radar who duly shrugged off his Parkrun victory over 956 others a few hours earlier to close us home. Welcome to the team Andy, we’ve been trying to get you out for months, but you were worth the wait.

It all meant an excellent set of silver medals, behind an outstanding Tonbridge team, with the likes of Kent way down in 6^th. Finally a very special menche for the Trondheim Stallion for scrapping for every point and winning us the 8-to-score by virtue of a tie but closing in three seconds and 1 position ahead of the 8^th Tonbridge man. Marvellous fighting spirit that perfectly summed up our day.

Men. 1 P Owor (Belgrave) 25:43; 2 J Gilbert (Kent) 26:14; 3 D Lacy (Cambridge) 26:24; … 11 T Telkovsky 27:46; 18 A Jaksevicius 28:12; 24 N Bundle 28:39; 26 R Maddams 28:46; 29 W Cockerell 29:06; 40 K Hegvold 30:00; 50 M Welsh 30:20; 80 T Weeks 31:48; 114 T O'Neill 34:19.  213 finished.

Teams: 1 Tonbridge AC 38; 2 Belgrave H 46; 3 Hercules W 65; 4 Thames H&H 74; 5 Herne Hill H 79; 6 Kent AC 83. 42 teams closed in from 16 clubs.

8-to-score:  1 Belgrave H 165; 2 Tonbridge 165; 3 Hercules 263.  15 teams closed in.

Women. 1 S Ward (Herne Hill) 31:34; 2 M Wilkins (Belgrave H) 31:52; 3 C Grima (HW) 32:08; … 6 Z Doyle 32:45; 10 C Lovegrove 33:37; 11 K Mackenzie 33:52; 13 J Rhodes 34:47; 24 G Marek 35:48.  105 finished.

Teams: 1 Belgrave H 29; 2 Kent AC 68; 3 Ranelagh 71; 4 Herne H 82; 5 Hercules W 83.  19 teams closed in from 10 clubs.