Temple Park, 10th December 2022
On what was a sunny but bitterly cold day with no wind the 116th running of the North East Cross Country Championships took place at Temple Park, South Shields.
This was a gathering of the best runners from all over the North East taking part. With conditions being frosty and under foot the ground was rock hard, the choice of footwear was quite difficult.
Although as stressed how cold it was the Elswick Juniors warmed the hearts of the Elswick coaches, parents and grandparents with their tremendous effort and application. Elswick number’s were down due to seasonal illnesses and those that didn’t run made the right decision not to turn out in those conditions.
The course itself was relatively flat, for cross country, with only rolling hills thrown in.
Elswick Harriers and Heaton Harriers jointly hosted this and, along with north east officials, did a tremendous job. Next time you are at a race don’t forget to thank them as they do a great job standing out in all weathers.
First Race of the day was the non championship under 11 race
Approx 1.6K – Boys: 14th Kallen O’Neil 7.26 – 20th Jack Galvin 7.40
Approx 1.6K – Girls: 8th Millie Robson 7.23
Approx 3K – Under 13 Boys: 22nd Dominic Kelso 11.51 – 44th Tom Bentley 14.25 – 46th George Russell 14.41 – 7th Team
Approx 3K – Under 13 Girls: 21st Izzy Durham 13.06 – 38th Charlotte Taylor 14.25
Approx 4K – Under 15 Boys 39th Adam Jeavans 18.39 – 43rd Aiden Jones 19.27
Approx 4K – Under 15 Girls: 11th Erin Blight 18.01 – 19th Poppy Wilde 18.36 – 27th Jess Donnelly 19.20 – 36th Sydney Bungay 20.45 – 40th Ava Durham 21.19 – 43rd Hannah Waterhouse 22.36 – 5th Team
Approx 6K (but due to change in course it was around 7.5K) Under 17 Men: 11th Callum Eldridge 26.18 – 28th Bailey Shore 30.02 – 31st Adam Robinson 32.12 – 5th Team
Under 17/20 Women: (run as one race for teams but positions for relevant ages) approx 4/5K
Under 17: 3rd Imogen Bungay 16.35 – 21st Bella Russell 18.34 –
Under 20: 12th Imogen King 20.34 4th Team
The next race is part of the NEHL series and once again and will be held at Temple Park. The Sherman Cup/Davison Shield is on the 7th January. The course layout will be different and you will revert back to your NEHL number.
There are no packs for this race, all are off scratch. To compete for the cup/shield all categories from under 13s to masters scores are taken into account, so we need as many runners as possible to turnout.
We have every chance of doing well if we get teams out across the board.
Report by Jan and Ken