We had mixed fortunes at the third fixture of the North West London cross country league at Trent Park last Saturday. Among the most pleasing results were a couple of top-three places, and good team positions for the U15 girls and the U17 men.
With Nicola Ravenhill injured, the U15 girls’ team was not at full strength, but Erica Wallace had a fine run to finish 3rd, being narrowly beaten to second in the closing metres. Backed up with solid performances from Laura Stewart in 8th and Roisin Lynch in 11th, the team finished second on the day. The squad was completed by Leah Kelly (20th) and Jennifer Connelly (22nd).
In the younger age groups, the U13 girls finished sixth on the day. Lucy O’Brien led them home in 6th place, followed by Anisa Ibrahim in 20th. An impressive kick in the final 50 metres from Rosie Cox (26th) gained two valuable places. Fiona Coutts was the only representative in the U11 girls race, finishing 17th.
The U17 men fielded a full team, led home by the reliable Mukhtar Farah in third. With Conor McCarthy in 9th and novice Raunak Mainali in 12th, they finished third.
For the under 15 boys, George Kerry (12th) and Luke Adar (24th) were back out in action, and put in their usual good effort, though the lack of other team members has set back their prospects in the league.
Conversely, the under 13 boys once again had runners to spare. The improving Lucas Sheehan (5th) put in another strong performance to finish a few places further up the field than last time, but there was then quite a gap to Robbie Connelly in 24th and Matteo Vao in 26th. Timothy Wallace, Kane Foster and Kirk Lebdiri completed the line-up in 36th, 41st and 43rd respectively.
There were just two representatives in the U11 boys’ race: Dylan Foster (39th) and Mikey Kouwiloyan (42nd) were both running only their second race for the club.