2009 ECCA relays - Different year, same story
The 2009 ECCA relay charge at Mansfield
Consistency was the name of the game for Bedford and County AC’s men as they retained their English Cross Country Association relay title in Mansfield on Saturday. Although none of the quartet managed to dip under the magical 15 minutes for the 5km course…
….they we still strong enough to hold off Blackheath and Bromley Harriers AC for a comfortable 23 second win.
Fastest time of the day went to Blackheath’s Mike Skinner, in a very swift 14:47, ahead of team-mate Scott Overall. Youngster Mitch Goose and Nick McCormick also managed to nudge below 15 minutes. However, it was the strength of the Bedford boys (with Matt Draper replacing Owain Matthews in an otherwise unchanged line-up from 2008) that won the day with Matt Janes, Darren Deed and Neilson Hall all running consistently fast legs to take the crown.
Mike Skinner
Behind Bedford, Blackheath took second, chased home by Bristol and Morpeth, for a highly charged podium battle.
It was a similar story in the women’s event as Charnwood AC easliy retained their ECCA relay title of 12 months ago. The expected challenge from the Aldershot and Farnham girls never materialised after they ended the first leg in a relatively lowly 14th position. Even with the mighty Steph Twell on the last leg the Surrey team were left with too much to do and settled for fourth as the Midlanders of Charnwood took the lead on leg 2 through the ever-green Tara Kizywicki, and didn’t looked back. Bristol and West AC and Woodford Green made up the women’s 1-2-3.
Twell aiming to leave her mark
Twell had the consolation of collecting the fastest leg prize, racing around the 3km course for comfortably the fastest time of the day in 9:35.
Visit the ECCA site for full results.
Images and on-site race reports to follow.
