By Simon Coombes 

 

The Ampthill Trophy is a yearly cross country event that takes place over a usually fast but hilly, two and a half lap 8k course around Ampthill Park. Although 'fast but hilly' may seem a contradiction in terms, anyone that has run it will know what I mean – one of those courses that is generally quite firm and with some decent downhill stretches you can get some decent momentum going…until the next hill! The weather for the race was fine, although I was slightly disappointed that the cold and still conditions that had greeted the marathoners the week before had changed to windier and warmer. Yes never happy! I was happy to be joined by John Adam to bolster the LBAC quota for the main race with his tales of previous races and battles he has had (all friendly he assures me…).

 

So the 219 of us in the main race set off at 11am, I decided at sit in behind young Jack Benedicter and Paul Farmer from Ampthill & Flitwick – at a pace faster than me or Paul really wanted to set off in (as we agreed after). Paul is a 14.45 5k man coming back to fitness, so when we dropped Jack I thought I would sensibly share the lead with him. So we huffed and puffed around one and a half laps until I managed to grind out a lead out which I managed to keep for the remainder of the last lap, coming over the line in a time of 30.06. Obviously very happy to win, but it felt really hard and not surprisingly I had found out that I had run 25 seconds quicker in 2008 for third place. John was happy to have 14 runners behind him to come in 204^th in a time of 57.13 – not bad for a vet 65!

 

The junior race set off at 10am – with some great performances from LBAC athletes. The most notable performances were from Melissa Chapman and Chloe May came first and second respectively in the Girls Under 11 category, Sam Nicholas who was second in the boys Under 13's and Jordan Clay who was second in the boys Under 15's.

 

So a good but tiring morning was had by all – a race that should firmly be in the calendar of LBAC athletes who want to do a good event and get some valuable extra cross country practise in!