At the 32nd running of the “Cross Italica” cross country in Seville Spain, which runs through and around a major Roman archaeological site, the England party got off to a great start with the Junior girls winning in style, taking the first four places with Georgia Malir in first place, followed closely by Bronwen Owen, Katy Wood and Tessa McCormick. In truth the girls were far to good for the opposition but remained very competitive throughout the race.
The Junior Men quickly followed, on this excellent course in Spanish sunshine, although with recent rain there was both mud and lying water to contend with. After a steady and sensible start the team slowly moved through to the front taking a couple of Spanish juniors with them. Gradually the Spanish athletes dropped off the pace slightly and with Matt Shirling pushing hard at the front he secured victory followed by Alex George, Eliot Bowker with Dan Jarvis in 4thhaving done a lot of the early work.
The senior ladies were in high class company and soon appearing at the front were the African contingent. Lily Partridge was not at all overawed giving chase and keeping the three front runners in her sights. Lily was eventually just beaten into 5th place by Ethiopian Gebre, with the Kenyan Cherono in 3rd and ahead of her Ayalew and Heroye from Ethiopia in 1st and 2nd place. This was a superb run from Lily beating the Spanish pair of Rodriguez and Martin with Chloe Richardson just 12 seconds behind Lily in 8th place. Lauren Deadman in 13th and Gemma Kersey in 21st completed the England team, all of them performing very well in this quality field.
The senior men’s team race was also dominated by Africans taking the first three places, headed home by Paul Tanui, followed by Toroitich and Bett. England’s first runner was Jonathon Taylor who ran very strongly throughout the race for an excellent 12th place over the 11K course, leading home Dan Studley in 18th, closely followed by the fast finishing Jon Thewlis (20th) and Tom Wade suffering a little with a head cold in 27th.
This was a thoroughly successful weekend for all the athletes providing them with valuable experience of a top quality event away from home, which can only add to their development as athletes.
