Surrey County Road Relays, Wimbledon Park

Autumn season starts with a win

The Autumn season kicked off with a fine afternoon's racing at Wimbledon Park - the seventh occasion the Surrey relays have been held at this venue. For the Belgrave men it was seventh heaven as a second successive win continued a tremendous sequence that started with a low point (an incomplete team) in 1998, and then followed up with 2nd, 2nd, 2nd, 2nd, 1st and 1st. The women's team have picked up bronze medals three times in that period but on this occasion finished just out of the frame. Their sequence now runs: 3rd, 2nd, 6th, 3rd, 3rd, 4th for the last six races.

And maybe it's about time that we recorded our thanks to Herne Hill's John Gebbels. With an able band of helpers, he has organised the event on each occasion at Wimbledon, after the race moved from the busy roads around Walton (and of course he was much involved before the move).

By the time the starter's whistle blew at 12 noon, twenty-four Belgrave men and six women had gathered for the race - which must itself be a record. The weather was ignoring the meteorologists' predictions and remained sunny and warm - but a mischievous wind took delight in lurking around corners and viciously leaping up to blast the runners when they least expected it, reserving its strongest gusts for each ascent of the hill past the tennis courts. It became apparent that all times were about ten seconds slower than might have been run in calmer conditions.

For the men's A team it was solid running right the way through the squad, nothing outstanding but no more than 30 seconds covering the lot of them. Several men ran slower than might have been expected but it was obvious that the windy conditions had much to do with that. Mark Humphrey suffered on leg one as he went off too fast but nevertheless came home inside his predicted time. It was great to see Essex Team Manager Tony Barden back in action and when he was followed up by our old Captain "Gerry" Adams it was quite like old times - except that between them they were about three stone heavier and three minutes slower than they were a few years ago.

Measuring his progress towards top fitness, B-runner David Anderson provided fireworks on leg two as he set out after the fourteen men ahead of him and succeeded in picking off the lot. His 13:50 was over half a minute faster than anyone else achieved - and that in spite of leaping a steeplechase barrier as his stage commenced, forced to get into the take-over zone the hard way when officials decreed that he was entering the area from the wrong direction, and then hurdling a fence to avoid running down a mother and baby while running on the paths within the park towards the end of his lap.

Adam Leane had made good progress for the 'A's so with two stages gone Belgrave occupied 1st and 3rd - with the teams the wrong way round! A true Geordie, David was again in the non-scoring 'B' outfit to preserve his North Eastern Counties qualification.

The correct order was established by the halfway mark as Lee Greatorex moved the 'A's into second place. Thames were away in front but Roger Alsop had one of our best runs of the day as he closed the gap to just 1 second, leaving Will Cockerell to open up a winning margin. Veteran Knut Hegvold ran well on the final leg to double our advantage as Thames faded and South London Harriers came through to win the "silvers".

Others to impress, among the 'B's, were James Browne - who surely would have been in the first team but for a climbing accident in Yellowstone Park a month earlier - and Junior Galley who never seems to have a bad run in relays but does worry the supporters sometimes: on this occasion Junior was still clad in full tracksuit as Dave Anderson entered the arena in the lead.

Anne Hegvold has been out for some time through injury and was apologetic for "only" offering 7th place after the first leg, but Syreeta Stracey was delighted when she found she was close to her previous best for the course in spite of having "not done much lately". Syreeta's effort brought the Belles up three places and Helen Alsop and Rachel Weston kept that forward momentum going - but there were no medals this time around.

Men

1 Belgrave 1:30:58; 2 South London 1:33:50; 3 (n/s) Belgrave 'B' 1:34:46; 4 Guildford & Godalming 1:35:05; 22 teams started and 19 teams finished.

A - M.Humphrey (10) 15:29; A.Leane (3) 15:08, L.Greatorex (2) 15:15; R.Alsop (2) 15:00; W.Cockerell (1) 15:03; K.Hegvold M40 (1) 15:03.

B - A.O'Beirne (14) 16:22; David Anderson (1) 13:50; J.Galley M40 (3) 15:52; J.Webb (4) 16:40, S.Zealey (3) 16:26; J.Browne (3) 15:36.

C - A.Barden (15) 16:28; G.Adams (16) 17:13, T.Watt (14) 17:20; P.Doyle (Ranelagh guest) (11) 15:07.

Fastest: 1 D.Anderson (Belgrave) 13:50; 2 I.Harkness (Thames 14:30; =3 A.Moses (Reigate P) & S.Major (South London) 14:32; 5 N.Altmann (Thames) 14:34.

Veterans - A.Binda (4) 16:54, H.Corbett (9) 19:11, R.Walsh (12) 20:40.

Women

1 Ranelagh 1:11:10; 2 South London 1:11:27; 3 Wimbledon Windmilers 1:12:17; 4 Belgrave 1:14:51; 18 teams started and 15 teams finished.

A - A.Hegvold W35 (8) 18:25; S.Stracey (5) 18:47; H.Alsop W35 (5) 19:34, R.Weston (4) 18:05.

B - S.Gailey (10) 19:59; C.Eastham (11) 21:32.

Fastest: 1 J.Ronaldson (Ranelagh) 16:30; 2 L.Crawford (South London) 16:50; 3 N.Buckley (Wimbledon W) 17:18; 4 R.Disley (Thames) 17:23; 5 C.Evans (South London) 17:26.

Restored from the club's earlier website, belgraveharriers.com, and published here as originally written.