Met League 2, Seniors: Abigail and Videsh lead the way
The Met League returned to Ealing, Southall and Middlesex’s home course at Horsenden Hill for the first time in 10 seasons. Traditionally this course was the season-closer. This time it was dryer, run in the opposite direction, and starting at the Gaelic football grounds on the far side of the park from previously. Horsenden was the scene of the Woodford men’s team hoisting the trophy aloft four years in a row, and though we can’t yet aim that high again, there was a definite flavour of that golden period in the team and performances, with the standout performances coming from the young blood of Abigail Reid and Videsh Weerakkody. The men’s team was an impressive coalition including recent A-team stalwarts, first-year juniors, parents alongside or already-having-watched offspring, and U23s blooming into fully-fledged seniors, making for a race-day squad of 19 athletes, that came 6th, and 4th ‘A’ team. The women were 7th, another pleasing position demonstrating their ever-increasing depth.
70 photos by Alex Wardle
Abigail Reid made her senior Met League debut with a very impressive run. She finished in 8th place and was comfortably the first U20 lady home, commenting on how she enjoyed the race and how pleased she was with her performance.
Next home was Louise Gilbert in 12th. With another month of cross-country training under her belt, this was a much improved position from her 23rd place at Claybury and we look forward to seeing if she can continue this trend at Uxbridge!
Next home was new recruit Jenna Sheehy (88th) who made her debut for WGEL at this fixture. Having set off cautiously in her first cross-country race for many years, she worked hard to chase down Claire Allen on the third lap and just pipped her to the line - finishing 1 second ahead. We were pleased to see Claire returning to the Met League and she was pleased with her 89th position finish.
Team manager Kate Stockings returned to the scoring 6 with her 109th finish ahead of training partner Katie Olert in 125th who closed the A team for the day. Both ladies enjoyed the gentle undulations of this course far more than the brutal hills of Claybury! Louise Cherry was another fan of the course. She finished in 169th and was pleased with her pace improvement since her Claybury debut.
Finally, it was great to see Emma Lord return from university to make her senior Met League debut. Emma was just behind Louise in 174th position and enjoyed the opportunity to catch up with club members at the fixture.
First Woodford man in from the men’s race was Videsh Weerakkody, scooping a second Met League PB in as many races with his 11th place; belying the stronger field that resulted in almost everyone else finishing somewhat lower than at Claybury. Videsh still described his race as having gone out hard and dying a little, but this is only in relative terms. He is maintaining higher positions, for longer, and losing less ground towards the end than ever before.
Tom Beedell was next in in 17th place, managing an inconvenient illness that, with the benefit of a light training week, has clearly not set back his whole-running-system too much. Tom Adolphus, like his former training partner Videsh, also scooped a Met League PB with his 24th place, and was, rightly, pretty happy with this. Michael Waddington was close behind in 31st, declaring this an “ok” return given the 9-month gap since his last cross-country race and dealing with a quick pitstop to adjust his spike that had been partly sucked off in the mud.
Angus Holford (51st) had a mid-race tussle with debutant Nate Harding (67th), the first of our three U20s on the day. Angus only pulled away after Nate unfortunately slipped on one particularly muddy corner, but Nate’s race compares favourably with the debuts of Adolphus and Weerakkoddy in this age group, and we hope and expect his career will lead to similar things. Nathan Wright is another U20 athlete that would normally feature for us but he was racing in Cardiff, finishing an impressive 19th in the UK Cross Challenge event.
Dan Steel shepherded his hamstrings round to 111th place. Simon Beedell, unlike others in the team, found that the course allowed him to pick a pace and maintain, and he enjoyed his run for 122nd place. A source close to Harold Wyber (130th) reveals that his laces came undone mid-race, but that didn’t stop him convincingly winning a race-off with a regular nemesis Neil Kirkham from Victoria Park, by just 7 seconds but as many places in this densely packed part of the field.
Rhys Edwards was pleased to celebrate his birthday, as he put it “running around in circles”. He felt better than at recent races with his 144th place, and the team felt better still for the post-race chocolate-biscuit-cake handed round on his behalf. Bertie Powell was 174th, and will now wrap himself in cotton wool and plan for every possible transport eventuality to get himself on the start line for what will be his 100th consecutive senior Met League at Uxbridge.
The scoring 12 was closed by a brace of U20s in only their 2nd senior Met League race. Godwinner Nkebani was 187th, recounting the relentlessness of the hills keeping coming. Vladirmirs Kalinins was 205th, and closing around 15 seconds on his teammate relative to Claybury. Both have adjusted their race strategy well to the doubling of the distance from the U15/17 race they were used to last year.
The B team came 4th in the 3rd division standings and currently top the season rankings. They were led in by Peter Caton, who was 222nd, after returning from “warm weather training” found that the cold weather, the muddy and hilly course was “deceptively hard”. Chris Hogg was 260th and pleased to run a quicker average speed than at Claybury. Asif Hussain was 359th. Asif felt he had a little too much left in the tank at the end but this made for a strong finish, and an enjoyable run. Ben Stockill was 371st, weighed down by his growing Movember ‘tache, especially at the ditches. With the next fixture at Uxbridge, famed for its river crossing, unusually falling inside November, a greater challenge lies ahead but Ben will be ready. Richard Hogg snuck into the top 400 with his 395th place. Just like the Horsendon Hill venue, Richard has ended a 10 year hiatus from the Met League this season, and after the relative dry of Claybury the boggy parts of the course made the race harder than expected. Nevertheless, his finish locked out the unofficial Woodford father-and-son’s team race for the day. Paul Stockings was unfortunate to pull a muscle at the end of the first lap, but stuck at it to finish in 431st. Roger Green was 442nd, and 2nd in his V75 age group; achieving his pre-race aim to not come last with almost two minutes to spare.
A few will be competing at the London Champs next week but attention is already turning towards the next Met, with the prospect of a significant milestone to be celebrated and rumours of previous squad members gracing us with their presence.