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A classic day of sport - January 27, 2007
Against the odds, given the remote location, the Southerns produced a classic day of sport, and the 20 strong Belgrave gaggle that made the journey up to The Wash surely have no regrets. Holkham Hall is a sublime place and made for one of the top ten most enjoyable day’s racing of my career. The course was mercifully kind, and the uphill drags aside was very straightforward. However, that means everyone found it easy and at one stage I was duelling with a 1:46 800-metre runner, a 1,500 metre man, a purist 5k man, a 43-year-old, and me the creaking marathoner… that’s cross-country for you – a melting pot of everyone who thrives on a challenge and loves to run.
One of the cross-country duels of the Century
I knew the Lobbster and the Wickster were set up for one of the cross-country duels of the Century. Yes, there have been others: Openshaw and Haughian at the ’01 National, Lobb and Mitchinson at the ’04 Southerns spring to mind, but this was always going to be stellar. Phil has been running incredibly as we know, and Huw is at the top of his game with the Tokyo Marathon looming large. He put in a lightning track session Tuesday night and when asked if he was gonna take it easy on Wednesday replied: “I’ll just do 7 miles in the morning… and then 5 laps of Hampstead Heath in the afternoon for a 22-mile day.” Gulp. My heart said Phil would win, my head said Lobb.
Our team performance was almost our best for a generation and more – but for City of Norwich surprisingly duffing us up – all credit to them. Our 6th place matched our return from 2000 – where we scored 452 points to Saturday’s 462. The Southerns is nearly the ultimate litmus test of the state of a club’s cross-country team and our results since 1991 make quite painful reading, but the evidence is there that we have potential to medal in these championships one day in the next five years. For this edition’s stat attack, here are Belgrave’s Southern positions since 1991: 51st, 21st, 43rd, no team, no team, no team, no team, no team, 16th, 6th, 9th, 14th, 10th, no team, 8th, no team, 6th.
You'll love the National
However, note the word nearly! The ultimate test of a club’s cross-country pedigree is of course the National, and this century our record has been magnificent as we’ve been the fifth most successful club in England. Let’s keep that record going in Sunderland on March 10th. I hope we’ll send a team of at least a dozen runners, and if the team spirit and camaraderie is anything like it was on Saturday then it’ll be a terrific day, as, frankly, the National always is. For those who haven’t sampled it, disregard the journey to get there: if you like running, you’ll love the National. I have noted that our win at Leeds three years ago was the “cream of all days”, let’s go and chase more glory.
Before that, another treat on February 10th with the final Surrey League at Petersham, and Ranelagh’s fast, beautiful and historic course. We had a trio of fine wins there in ’99, ’00 and ’01; perhaps we can end our quiet league campaign with a flourish.
