It’s only Mud
Cold and damp, perfect conditions on Sunday for the final race in the 2022 Club Championship, at Allestree, the latest stop in 2022/23 Derby Runner Cross Country League. The six-mile course was challenging but it did not deter the Club’s man for all terrains, Chris Pearson, leading the Club’s contingent home in a superb seventh place in the men’s race. Only two places back was Mike Nash, who made his cross-country race debut look extremely easy. The friendly rivalry between these two training partners promises to push both on to greater things in future years. Seb Van Dijk again performed well over the country to finish in twenty third place with Steve Green and Danial Bower, who have both had wonderfully consistent seasons, not far behind in twenty ninth and thirty third places, respectively. Chris Hanman performed well to finish in forty fourth place with David Green and Rom Chambard completing the men’s team finishers in fifty seventh and sixty sixth places. Men’s team skipper, Andy Orme, was next to cross the line in eighty fifth with outgoing Club Champion, Ross Ballinger, and the battling MV65, Colin Mee not far behind in ninety first and ninety fifth places, respectively. Steve Leafe battled round to finish in a hundred and first place with the improving Paul Hudson in a hundred and twenty eighth. David Walters, Colin Sharp, Gareth Simpson, and Danny Scott completed the Club’s finishers in the men’s race in a hundred and thirty second, a hundred fiftieth, a hundred and fifty first and a hundred and fifty eighth places, respectively.
In the women’s race Christina Hawtin, looked right back to form as she stormed round to finish in eighth place getting the better, on this occasion, of Sara Insley, who herself has gone from strength to strength this season and here finished in a very respectable eleventh place. Lisa Wright ran gamely for thirty first place with the battling Emma Sharp completing the team finishers in the women’s race. Excellent team support was provided by Sarah Walters in eighty fourth, mum Julianne Walters in eighty fifth, Sarah Green in eighty ninth place, Lucy Cartwright in ninety fourth with the indefatigable Pauline Cooper in ninety eighth place completing the Club’s finishers in the women’s race.
