English clubs battle for area cross-country glory

Many of the country’s top runners compete at Graves Park in Sheffield, Wormwood Scrubs in London and Aldersley Stadium in Wolverhampton

NORTHERN ATHLETICS CROSS-COUNTRY RELAYS, Graves Park, Sheffield, South Yorkshire, October 19

Persistent and heavy overnight rain had all but stopped before the first races got underway leaving parts of the course a bit soggy but, thankfully and unlike last year, the event was not cancelled.

Hallamshire, with three of the top five fastest times, led by their lead-off man Euan Brown, won by more than a minute from Salford. The women’s race was taken by Trafford with their twins Ava and Sara Clough providing the backbone of their trio.

Men

Hallamshire were in control throughout in the Cutlers Relay, a long-standing men’s event that well predates the advent of area cross-country relay championships.

They were ahead from the start after Brown gave them an opening leg lead over their two-mile lap with a 10:09 split. That time was to remain as the best of the afternoon.

That was just a second quicker than Sunderland’s Joe Armstrong and the pair were together for much of the lap. Brown said: “I managed to make a break”, but this was only after an early effort by Salford’s Alex Ediker, who later admitted he had “underestimated the last bit.”

Tommy Power, who had been ill earlier in the week, and Jamie Richardson increased the advantage before new signing Alfie Manthorpe completed the job with the race’s third best effort of 10:15.

Manthorpe said of his run: “The course cut up a bit and it was a bit wet, but it’s hard to gauge it. That was my first race for Hallamshire, as my old club Sheffield and Dearne, were not competitive.”

Salford took the under-17 men’s race over a 2.3km lap and their Bobby Burton was just behind Rotherham’s Mikey Bacon at the end of stage one, before Jamie Barber took them narrowly ahead after two legs.

Bacon said: “I took it easy then me and Bobby went away before I got him at the finish.”

Then it was down to Evan Grime, the Northern champion and Inter-Counties runner-up, to finish things off and he did so with the fastest stage time of 6:51.

Hallamshire had earlier taken the under-15 boys age group title and Harry Kirkman gave the Sheffield based club the lead mid-race before Thomas Thake, the 2023 under-15 Inter-Counties champion, wound things up with the fastest split of the age group, at 6:42.

He said: “We knew that we…