A sparkling run from Lewes athlete Ben Martin gave Sussex their only Top Ten placing in the National Cross-country Championships at Donnington Park on Saturday.
Lucky seven was the number for Martin who is not even the County champion yet he turned in the run of his life in the U15 race against some four hundred runners.
George Poole from Hastings also had a fine run in this age group placing 33rd.
There was also a Top Twenty placing in the U20 women’s event when Leah Harris from Worthing, who certainly seems to have struck a rich vein in recent weeks, to place 16th.
Overall Sussex participation at this event was a little disappointing and after pouring through thousands of names, seventeen hundred finishers in the senior men’s event and approaching 5000 in the eight races, I can only find one Sussex Club that completed a team and that was Chichester who finished 52nd in the senior men’s event.
There were some pretty good runs in the this event with Ross Skelton (Brighton Phoenix), who lost the early part of the season though injury, having a tremendous run to make the top fifty placing 41st.
In this event you do not get the hordes of joggers and walkers that you do in many Road races and to make the top 200, there were 1700 plus finishers ploughing through eight miles of mud, is a considerable achievement.
Howard Bristow (Brighton & Hove) finished 60th with Chris Zablocki (Chichester) 69th, Jon Pepper and Josh Guilmant (Phoenix) 73 and 90th, Matt Dumbrell (Brighton & Hove) 110th, James Baker (Chichester ) 126th and Jonathan Crickmore (Brighton & Hove) 139th all doing exceptionally well.
Harry Leleu (Chichester was the first Sussex runner home in the U20s placing 59th while Dan Stidder (Eastbourne) placed 80th in the U17s and Isaac Elam (Hastings) 28th in the U13s.
In the Girls events Hastings’ Maya Ramnarine was 23rd in the U13s and Ellen Crombie 40th in the U15s.