James leads Striders to relay victory and finishes high in Surrey Champs

James Bennett, from Striders of Croydon, produced an excellent run in the Ranelagh 10 kilometre road race at Richmond on Sunday, which incorporated the Surrey Championship. He placed eleventh of the 639 finishers, in a personal best 34 minutes 04 seconds. Club colleague Iain Harrison was 22nd (34.59) with Michael Stewart 71st (37.09). Krzysztof Klidzia was third in the over-50 category, placing 79th overall (37.32). Striders’ women were led by Becky Laurence who was 313rd overall (45.14) with Carolyn Storey 368th (47.09).

Striders won the Dinosaur Dash 5K relay, organised by Crystal Palace Fun Runners, last week. The winning team comprised James Bennett (17.01), Iain Harrison (17.29) and Simone Luciani (17.17). Simone also won the weekly parkrun in Lloyd Park on Saturday (17.23).

In the second Southern Veterans League match of the season, at Ewell, Julian Spencer-Wood ran very well to win the M60 3000 metres in a club age-group record of 11 minutes 30.9, and also placed second in the 800 metres (2.40.5). Justin Macenhill won the M40 3000 metres (10.15.1), while Paul Cripps won the triple jump (9.54) and set a club M45 record of 7 metres 78 in the shot. For Striders’ women, Sandra Francis was second in the W50 long jump (2.97), while Rosemary Egbe set a club age-group record of 10 metres 64 in the W50 hammer. Good points came from the 3000 metres where Steph Upton was third in the A race (12.33.0) and Melanie Hinds was third in the B race (15.56.6). Striders’ women placed third, while their men were fourth of the seven clubs in the match.