English National Cross-Country Championships

Striders of Croydon faced strong opposition in the English National Cross-Country Championships, at Parliament Hill Fields on Saturday. Their men’s team placed 108th out of the 132 clubs which fielded complete teams of six. They were led by Andrew Aitken who ran well to place 554th out of 2087 finishers, completing the muddy 12-kilometre course in 53 minutes 23. Sebastian Munday was 874th (57:45) with Matthew Stone 963rd (58:58), Kerim Suruliz 1554th (68:13); Luke Burden 1656th (70:05), Andy Perks 1711th (70:55) and Simon Webster 2035th (86:12). In the senior women’s race, Steph Upton placed 637th out of 1010 finishers, completing the eight-kilometre course in 45 minutes 29, while Cindy Siu was not far behind her in 649th (45:46).

Earlier in the day, Striders had the first female finisher at three of the local parkruns. Niamh Vincent was the first woman to finish the South Norwood parkrun, placing ninth overall (21:52). Consuelo Kennefick was the first woman to finish the Riddlesdown parkrun, placing 13th overall (22:49). Selena Wong was the first woman to finish the Lloyd parkrun, placing 16th overall (24:51). Striders had three of the first four male finishers in the Lloyd parkrun, with Lee Flanagan placing second (19:54), Steve Corfield third (20:26) and John Punt fourth (20:46). Martin Filer was third in the Riddlesdown parkrun (20:32). Striders had a total of 82 finishers in the various weekly parkruns.

On Sunday morning, Thomas Finch placed fourth out of 90 finishers in the Lloyd junior parkrun, completing the two-kilometre course in 8 minutes 52 seconds.