Buckinghamshire Schools Cross Country Championships

Over seventy Chiltern Harriers youngsters ran in the Bucks Schools Champs at Stowe School on Wednesday for their schools. There were some great results on the tough, hilly courses and several athletes are in contention to represent Bucks Schools at the English Schools Championships in Kent on March 19th.

The 1.6k Year 5/6 Girls race opened the programme and the Chiltern girls involved all did well. Kara Gorman won convincingly with Nia Clarke second, Maya Davis third and Carys Jones ninth. There was also a good Chiltern presence in the Year 5/6 Boys event with Jacob McCall fourth, Luke Coultate sixth and Isaac McCall seventh.
 
The Minor Girls race (Year 7) over 2k saw a good run from Evelyn Wildman to be second. Megan Lockwood was fifth. The Minor Boys race had several Chiltern lads well up – Felix Danielli was third, Charlie Quantrill fifth, Hugo Mundy eighth, George Mawby (12th) and Theo Roughton (29th).
 
The biggest race of the day was the 3k Junior Girls (Years 8 and 9) which had 154 finishers. Lily Jessop-Tranter had her best race of the season to be third and there were good top 20 efforts from Marlie Nkoane (6th), Katie Allsop (11th), Alice Peckham (17th) and Olivia Clarke (18th). Also involved were Jocelyn Davies (22nd), Issy Robinson (28th), Ffion Harman (33rd), Florence Lee-Rubis (38th), Lucy Wilkinson (45th), Anna Stoneham (49th), Lydia Cross (56th), Rebecca Lawson (72nd), Anna Dalgas (81st), Keya Kara (84th), Charlotte Groose (86th), and Eleanor Horne (91st).
 
Daniel Munn looked strong to win the 4k Junior Boys race with Ales Hughes second, Rory Hilton fifth, Callum Powell sixth, and Max Roughton tenth. Zach Cleary was 18th, Aidan Suleyman 26th, and Danny Carruthers 76th. There were 132 finishers.
 
For both girls and boys the Intermediates and Seniors ran together. This made for interesting racing across four year groups. In the 4k girls race Inter Maddie Hughes was the overall winner. Other Chiltern runners featuring well in the Intermediate standings were Frankie Baxter fifth, Allegra Massey sixth, Lesedi Nkoane eighth and Ellie Shield tenth. Jo Snelling was 12th, Hannah Ashby 13th, Marea Logan 15th, and Ellie Gowers 32nd from 47 finishers.
 
The Senior Girls race saw four finishers in 2020. This year the figure was 32, a very encouraging increase. Holly Henderson was the best placed Chiltern girl in second. Abbie Henderson was fourth, Charlotte Docwra seventh, Olivia Edwards eighth, Alice Brown 10th, Jinaan Lockwood 17th, and Jess Cook 23rd.
 
The Intermediate and Senior Boys ran over a tough 5.6k route. Again the individual winner was an Intermediate, in this case Chiltern’s Alden Collier. Archie Pinder was fourth, Oakley Denson fifth, Euan Pinder sixth, Isaac Jessop-Tranter ninth, Rowan Gawne 10th, Jerry Anderson 11th, Max Baxter 12th, Sammy Bennetts 14th, Ethan McCall 16th, Jamie Shepherd 27th, Sammy Whibley 30th, and Felix Palmer 35th. There were 61 finishers.
 
In the Senior Boys Finn O’Brien was fourth, Ollie Meadowcroft seventh, Laurie Gawne 10th, and Charlie Stone 13th from 33.