Women's Reigate Priory Cross-country relays, 31 Oct 2015
The Long Chase Goodnight
Attempting to emulate their illustrious sisters of 2003 and 2004, an intriguing Belles trio came to defend their Reigate crown in brilliant sunshine.
We kicked off with debutante Lizzie Goldie-Scot who found herself in thumping form in early-summer before devoting July and August to globe-trotting hedonism. A couple of minutes over 5k has been lost but they’ll be reclaimed soon enough. This was a tough mission for LGS but she hung on doggedly, knowing that it was a pair of aces to come for us, but someone had to start the car! Just 80 yards back, Megs came to sample the competition atmosphere, and got 22nd fastest of the day for her trouble, out of 98 athletes.Right! Jojo went out in some isolation with Reigate’s lead 2:27 away, and Epsom, Herne Hill and Dulwich all looking good. Could we get back into this? Not too much happened for JJR in the first half, one scalp perhaps, as it was one of those leaps of faith a relay runner makes. You just have to believe that the concertina is happening out of sight but with no evidence that it is. Finally, after around 10 minutes, not one but three targets popped up. They were dealt with and suddenly Jojo found herself in 4th – we were back in this.
It was all guns blazing for the last few minutes as two more victims were claimed and it was just Reigate to go, and even they had trouble in their rear view. Jojo had run the stage’s fastest by 1:35, and suddenly it was hard to see past a Belgrave win.Zoe set off with 50 metres to make up on Reigate’s plucky Natalie Wilson, who defeated former Southern Cross champion Rachel Woodthorpe, so is no slouch. After a couple of minutes Zoe eased by though, hit the hill hard, and had a lonely run. Not ideal circs for a quick time, but even feeling laggard Zoe nicked second fastest of the day, and she's eking closer to matching in a race what her training suggests is possible.
As ARM wrote when the men defended this one back in 2000: “Back to the engravers again!”1 Belgrave H 51:43; 2 Reigate Priory 53:05; 3 Epsom & Ewell 53:14; 4 Crawley 53:34. 35 teams started, 31 finished.L Goldie-Scot (8) 18:25; J Rhodes (2) 16:46; Z Vail Smith (1) 16:32.M Bailey (9) 18:44.Fastest: 1 F Clark (RPAC) 15:58; 2 Z Vail Smith 16:32; 3 I Brindsen (E&E) 16:35; 4 J Rhodes 16:46. 