Kent XC Champs – Juniors

We were welcomed into 2019 with dry conditions and as good as they are ever going to get on this course in early January. The wind and open expanse always make it a tough challenge, mentally and physically.

Under 13’s We had only two girls in the U13’s, with Scarlett Bennett (34th) and Inez Rice in (56th) both making their XC debuts for the club. Again only two starters in the U13 Boys left us ruing what might of been in the Team results had we fielded a full team. Gervace Card had arguably his best race so far coming in 15th and had he started his sprint for home earlier he may have troubled the top 12. James Barnes spent most of the race in 4th place but wound up well over the final 600m to pass the unfortunate Medway athlete with 40m to go to claim the Bronze medal.

Under 15’s – 4,400m Ailbhe Barnes was our sole representative for the girls but wasn’t to be outdone by her U13 brother. Ailbhe showed her big race credentials yet again as she ran strongly to claim the bronze medal, only missing out on 2nd by 1 second. There was better representation in the U15 boys where we had 5 athletes on the starting line. Ethan Fiore was our first athlete home, his hopes of a top 10 finish dashed by a poor start. He spent most of the race on his own in 13th but s strong finish allowed him to gain a place to finish 12th.  Fredrik Nordgren starting at the back progressed well through the field to be our 2nd finisher followed by Thomas Carbin, Liam Carr and Luca Treadwell. We finished 6th team out of 7.

U17/20’s – 6,100m Lily Newton was our sole U17 woman scoring a very good 5th place and in a day of siblings matching each other Ella Newton was also 5th in the U20 race (run as the same time as the U17 women). A return to club colours for Sabrina Sinha made it two high finishers in the U20’s as she claimed the bronze medal. A highly competitive U17/U20 race for the men had Bailey Massey (U20) as our first finisher in 11th, followed up by Josh Olawunmi (U20) in 18th. John Okomayin was our only U17 in as 32nd.

We were disappointingly light on numbers but those that did turn out represented the club well. 3 medals and a further 6 of our athletes achieving top 20 finishes made for a successful day and something to build on.

Photos by Ian Miller