Chiltern League in Eton
By Nick Clay
With Christmas not long over, LBAC athletes took to Slough with not a Sleigh in sight! Although, the frost was cruel, Andy’s plea of O Come all ye Faithful on Wednesday’s Silent Night did not fall on deaf ears and you should break into song to read the next part of the report!
On the 20th day of Christmas our true love of running brought to us:
12 Large lads running*
11 Parents supporting
10 Lads a sprinting
9 Ladies racing
8th for the youngsters
7th for the older boys
6K for the women
Five Family Meads
4 Family Clays
3 Inchleys
2 Performing Pete’s
And only 1 John Adam (football chant)
*Tom is only little
A fantastic turnout by the ladies and awesome running saw them finish 5th overall on the day out of the 14 division one clubs. LBAC ladies racing history continues to be written race by race; Led home as always by Gail with the club’s new found talent Jo Breslin closely following. Amy and Jane made up the scoring four with support from Amelia, Anna Mead, Mandy, Kelly and Lorraine all having superb races adding valuable points for a race that we normally struggle to get many!
The juniors ran earlier in the day where Chloe and Melissa set the standard for the day having very good runs to finish 46 and 64 respectively in the U11 mob match race. Two new recruits in Grace Cross and Zara Taylor joined Becca – the first of the Meads – in the U13G to add points to the overall club tally. Having only competed over 600m before, Grace and Zara did well to complete the distance. Both did so in 45th and 50th position with Becca splitting the pair.
The U13boys were next up and Owen Drabwell, Patrick and the second of the Meads, Henry all ran well to gain 8th team place and some good improvements over individual placing’s that gain points for their overall club championship positions.
Although, the fields were down on numbers the quality was still there in abundance. The U15 Boys all ran hard but slipped back to 7th place, although they were only 12 points behind 3rd! The flat course obviously doesn’t suit them and back on home ground at Wing in February I’m sure they will move back up. The battle between Lloyd Milliken, Tom Boozer, Charlie Mead and Joe McGarry goes on, individual supremacy will be determined in the next race. Well done boys and keep up the fantastic commitment.
Our staunch U17s saw Billy not being the final Mead this time and Brian Foulger run brilliantly to claim another 7th team place.
In total the juniors got the club to 8th position and the ladies clearly helped the cause hugely.
The men got a reasonable number out, with 13 making an appearance and Ben led the team home, with Ian, Andy and Pete M in that order following behind with Tom, Gary, Warren, Nick, Rod and Chris W completing the 10. Chris D gave invaluable support as ever and Pete W and John were relieved when Warren and Ian turned up, as they were thinking they had to count!
The result was that the men were 10th overall, but within spitting distance of 8th place on the day. The club as whole is pretty secure in 9th place after four fixtures which currently equals our best ever effort in the league that we achieved last year.
There were no timing chips to be misplaced at this event so what else could get mixed up? We three kings from orient are…… racing with the same number! Harked the herald Andy. Mild panic broke out as he looked for his own vest having just raced in Jordan’s. Naively asking if a 15 year old would have put his vest away somewhere; Mandy was heard to say, that would bring Joy to the World as it would be a first!
Well done everyone God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen until the Southern’s in Brighton on the 28th January.
In addition: The final Chiltern League is on Saturday 11th February in Wing and is our home fixture. In addition to looking complete another excellent year in division one we will need lots of volunteers to marshall so please let Richard know if you (or anyone else you know) are willing to help a.s.a.p. so that he can plan. Please e-mail rinchley@hotmail.com to confirm.
