The new winter season got under way this weekend with the big first fixture of the Chiltern Cross-country League at Shotover Hill in Oxford. The first thing that has to be said is a huge thanks and congratulations to every one of the 34 runners who made it over to the event to support the club and do their bit. There were some great runs generally, but what stood out overall was what huge difference it made to have such a strong team effort.

The first runners out on the course were the U11's and Mathilde Sammons was the club's only representative, in what was her first race in the league. She put in a great effort to finish in 55^th position and then stayed for the whole day with her Dad Mark, to support all of the other races which was greatly appreciated. Exactly the same applies to Izzy Bidlake-Hull who ran in the U13 girls and finished in 65^th position and gained valuable points in our bid to stay in division one for the first time in many years.

The U13 boys saw Lloyd Milliken finish in the highest junior position of the day with 21^st place, leading home Patrick Clay who finished 42^nd in the first year in the age group. In the U17 men, Billy Mead continued his excellent current form with 23^rd place despite being a year young in the race. All of these runs have scored valuable points in our quest to stay up with the big boys.

However, following their excellent season last year the majority of the victorious U13's are now in the U15's and have joined Brian Foulger in the age group. They have therefore, not only gone up in divisions but are mostly a year young so their performance of finishing 8^th out of the 14 teams was a great effort. Brian lead the team home in 23^rd place after a flying start and Jordan Clay chased him home to finish 25 seconds behind in 33^rd place. Joe McGarry finished in 43rd at the start of a small pack of LBAC runners, with Jake Irvine, Charlie Mead and Luke Pratt coming home in 45^th, 46^th & 48^th respectively.

With all the junior races out of the way, it was the turn of the ladies to do their bit. In five races last year, only once did we get a full team out, but this weekend it was brilliant to see six ladies trekking off up the hill at the beginning and it gave a superb result. The ladies were lead home by Gail Duckworth who was first V55 by over four minutes and 14^th in the race. Jill Richardson's 30th, put her in the top third of the field, while Amy Inchley and Jane Sauer ran brilliantly despite injury and illness to finish in 37^th and 47^th respectively. Liz Miller and Amanda Martin also gave fantastic support to the team by knocking back scorers for the other clubs. As a result of the ladies efforts, they finished as the sixth team, ahead of the likes of Oxford, Luton & Bedford, absolutely fantastic.

In all the races, as we always try to emphasise, clearly the scoring are crucial, but every place that any LBAC athlete can gain means that it potentially takes away points from other clubs so numbers are a vital part of the tactics. This is never more important than in the senior men's race where there are so many points on offer. Seventeen (yes 17!) senior men started and finished the two lap course, up the toughest hill on the cross-country calendar and it made a huge difference as four other clubs finished behind us in the standings and if this can be continued throughout the season we'll be in division one again next year.

To mention some names, Jon Hull, six days after returning from doing the Cologne marathon, Chris Dimmock and Warren Rose in their debuts in club colours, Ian Roberts in his first race for a few years and Gary Stratford and Fred Watt all contributed hugely to the team effort. Just in front of them was Tim Inchley, who closed the scoring team in 147^th. Mark Field and Nick Clay had a good battle  ahead of Tim despite limited training in the run up and Chris Norman ignored recent injuries to be seventh scorer in 108^th place. Twenty seconds in front of Chris was a crazy battle where LBAC took "packing" to the extreme as five club members crossed the line in ten seconds, covering seven places from 96^th to 102^nd. These were Pete Foulkes, Tom Inchley (Not playing football for once), Craig Nelson (After a very long time out injured), Joby Hobbs and Pete Mackrell who I'm sure will continue their scrap in Watford! The other scorer for the team was Andy Inchley in 49^th place.

All in all, these results combine to leave us in 10^th place, out of the 14 teams in division one, which may not sound like much, but is about ten places higher than we were three years ago and we are competing with some huge clubs, such as Milton Keynes, Bedford & County, Harrow and the snappily titled Windsor, Slough Eton & Hounslow! So once again huge congratulations to everyone who ran and make sure you've got all the dates in your diary. Next up is Watford on the 13th November. See you there.